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TRACTS 



CONCERNING 



CHRISTIANITY. 



TRACTS 



CONCERNING 



CHRISTIANITY 







ANDREWS NORTON. 



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CAMBRIDGE : 

JOHN BARTLETT 

1852. 



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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1852, by 

Andrews Norton, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachuaetls, 



CAMBRIDGK: 
METCALF AND COMPANY, 

PRINTERS TO THE UNIVERSlTy. 



PRE FACE. 



The Tracts collected in this volume all have a 
common purpose, to vindicate the truths of Chris- 
tianity from errors which have been connected with 
them, or by which they have been assailed. But, 
in the interval between the composition of the ear- 
liest of these articles and the latest of them, errors 
of very different kinds, errors contradictory to and 
destructive of each other, have prevailed, some at 
one time, and some at another, in that portion of 
the Christian world with which we have most con- 
cern. We may hope that they are beginning to 
pass away ; but their pernicious consequences, and 
the causes by which they have been produced, will 
long remain ; and the errors themselves will con- 
tinue to appear, if not under their old, under new 
aspects. The truth has not yet made such progress 
as to take their place. If there be any value, there- 



vi PREFACE. 

fore, in these Tracts, it must be partly in their pres- 
ent, and partly in their historical relations. It is a 
preservative against false opinions to know their 
history, — to know that they have been maintained, 
and why theji^have been rejected. 



TRACTS 



CONTAINED IN THIS VOLUME 



PAOE 



I. A Defence of Liberal Christianity, . 1 

II. A Discourse on the Extent and Relations 

OF Theology, 59 

III. Thoughts on True and False Religion, 99 

IV. Views of Calvinism, 159 

V. A Discourse on the Latest Form of Infi- 
delity, 229 

VI. Remarks on the Modern German School of 

Infidelity, 269 

VII. On the Objection to Faith in Christianity, 
as resting on Historical Facts and Criti- 
cal Learning, ...... 369 



DEFENCE 



OP 



LIBEEAL CHRISTIANITY. 



INTEODUCTOEY NOTE 



The article which follows has not been republished since 
its first appearance, nearly forty years ago. It was written 
in a state of things very different from what now exists 
around us. Since that time the progress of this country in 
general literature, in the physical and exact sciences, and 
in religious liberality, has been very great ; not, perhaps, 
falling behind its advance in material prosperity. But, dur- 
ing the last forty years, there has not been in this country, 
nor in England, nor, I think, in any European country, (for 
I certainly do not regard Germany as an exception,) a cor- 
respondent progress in correct modes of thinking and rea- 
soning upon the highest subjects of human thought, or in 
establishing and clearly exhibiting those facts on which all 
rational conclusions concerning religion must rest. 

If the propositions concerning religion maintained in the 
following article are true, they are truths of equal impor- 
tance at all times. But the mode of presenting them may 
vary according to the errors to be opposed. The errors 
which I had in view in writing it are still the professed errors 
of a very large portion of Christians, — professed in their 
creeds, and insisted upon by many as their individual convic- 
tion. They have been called the distinguishing doctrines of 



4 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

Christianity ; and whatever disposition there may be to shrink 
from assenting to their literal statement, yet, in some dis- 
guised and mitigated form at least, they enter into most 
men's conceptions of our religion. But in what, I fear, may 
be called the general suspension of rational thought and 
feeling concerning religious truth, they are at the present 
moment lying comparatively dormant ; and their ill in- 
fluence is most felt in their repelling the minds of men, 
by the view of Christianity which they present, from any 
desire to know what Christianity really is. 

It was not so at the time when this article was written. 
Of the state of things then existing in the community in 
which I lived, I some time since gave an account in a letter 
to my friend, Mr. George Ticknor, in reply to a request for 
" information on the origin and progress of liberal views 
of Christianity in New England, and on Mr. Buckminster's 
relations to them." It was printed in the " Christian Ex- 
aminer " for September, 1849, and, with some unimportant 
omissions, is here subjoined. 

" As you know, there has been from an early period, I 
cannot say how early, a resistance to the rigid Calvinism of 
our forefathers, and to their false conceptions of religion. 
The authority of their system was broken in upon by the 
publication of Roger Williams's ' Bloudy Tenent,' in 1644. 
I cannot from memory trace the history of this resistance. 
Perhaps — I place no confidence in my recollections — 
the most important work against the peculiar doctrines of 
Calvinism, which subsequently appeared, was one published 
just a century later, in 1744, entitled, ' Grace Defended,' 
by Experience Mayhew, the missionary to the Indians, and 
the father of Dr. Jonathan Mayhew. But, from the middle 
of the last century, there was a considerable and increasing 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 5 

body, both of the clergy and the laity, who rejected with 
more or less explicitness the doctrines of Calvinism, and 
modified the doctrine of the Trinity into what has been called 
' high Arianism,' that is, into the proper, ancient, Arian 
doctrine. The name Arminian soon began to be familiarly 
used to denote such heretics, often with some epithet of dis- 
respect. The tendency to separation between the two par- 
ties had, indeed, commenced before the middle of the last 
century, and was increased by the preaching of VVhitefield 
in this country, who arrived for the first time in 1740, and 
whose extravagances and denunciations gave offence, and 
tended to weaken the credit of his doctrines. 

" This controversy, as men did not reason in those days 
from their spiritual intuitions, implied learning, and a critical 
knowledge of the Scriptures, after the fashion of those times. 
These studies extended even to the laity, some of whom 
were interested in settling their faith for themselves. One of 
the earliest books which I read relating to the exposition of 
the Scriptures, many years ago, when quite a young man, 
was a copy of the original edition of Taylor on the Romans, 
borrowed from the family of an old gentleman who had 
formerly recommended and lent it to my father. 

" Besides the main controversy between ' the Orthodox ' 
and ' liberal Christians,' there were other controversies, 
which kept alive a spirit of inquiry, and attention to theo- 
logical learning generally, and particularly to the critical 
study of the Scriptures ; such as those respecting Epis- 
copacy, and the doctrine of the fi.nal salvation of all men, 
in both of which Dr. Chauncy particularly distinguished 
himself. 

" But, if my recollection serves me correctly, there was 
in the last twenty years of the last century a suspension of 
controversy between our two great religious parties, a lull in 
1* 



6 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

our theological world, broken only by the writings of Hop- 
kins and his followers and opponents, which added nothing 
to the theological learning of our country. This condition 
of things was in a great measure produced by the state of 
public affairs in our own country and in Europe, which en- 
grossed men's thoughts and feelings. Religious opinions 
were less clearly defined ; clergymen, holding, as they con- 
ceived, opposite doctrines, did not in all cases feel bound to 
keep aloof from each other. This state of things continued 
into the present century; but the truce was soon broken. 

" One of the first symptoms of the renewed struggle was 
the appearance of the ' Panoplist,' * I think in 1804. In that 
publication I do not recollect any thing marked by its learn- 
ing or its power of general reasoning. It did nothing to 
promote theological science. But the flame which it was 
intended to kindle blazed forth on the election of Dr. Ware, 
who was a liberal Christian in the best sense of the words, 
and a good theological scholar, to the professorship of divinity 
in Harvard College. This was in 1805. But the controversy 
which followed was not managed with extraordinary ability 
by the liberal party. Through the influence of many causes, 
which rendered the fact natural and excusable, members of 
that party were not sufficiently explicit in the avowal of their 
opinions ; there was a tendency among them to represent 
themselves as not essentially disagreeing with their opponents ; 
and in general, though the superiority of the liberal party in 
learning was then acknowledged, they wanted the learning 
necessary to give them assurance in their opinions, and to 
enable them fully and satisfactorily to explain and defend 
them. The feelings of resistance in the other party were 
very strong and active. They denounced their opponents 

* A periodical publication. 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 7 

as enemies of the Gospel, and excluded from the hope of 
salvation. This strong language, which may sound so 
strangely in our times, is fully supported by the controversial 
writings of that period. I may refer especially to the dif- 
ferent Letters of Dr. Worcester to Mr. Channing, Dr. 
Worcester having come forward at a later date (in 1815) as 
a champion of the Orthodox party. The prestige of Ortho- 
doxy continued very powerful ; and there were many whose 
own opinions would have borne no severe test, who yet 
shrunk from any direct opposition to it. I cannot fix the 
precise date, but it was after 1805, that I was informed by 
a young minister, that, on his professing his disbelief of the 
Trinity, he was told by one of the most distinguished clergy- 
men of Boston, and a most liberal-minded man, that he had 
better not publicly avow it. 

" It was in this state of things, in 1805, when he was not 
yet twenty-one years old, that Mr. Buckminster was or- 
dained as pastor of the society in Brattle Street. In less 
than eight years, — eight years interrupted by constant ill- 
health, and by constant labors and avocations connected with 
his ministry, — he was taken from us. The blossoms and 
fruits of his mind — ripe fruits — appeared together. I 
have nothing to add to the opinions I expressed, immediately 
after his death, in the 'General Repository,' concerning 
the influence of his genius, his learning, his whole char- 
acter, in promoting and giving an impulse to all good litera- 
ture among us, and especially to the liberal and enlightened 
study of theology. These opinions were afterwards con- 
firmed by the corresponding views presented in the excel- 
lent Memoir of him, by his friend and mine, Mr. Thacher. 
This Memoir, and the notices of him in the General Reposi- 
tory, (there were two,) are prefixed to the last edition of his 
Sermons. 



8 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

" I will go on to mention a few facts which throw light on 
the state of religious opinion and feeling, and of theological 
learning, during the period of which I have spoken. In 1812, 
I published, as editor, the first volume of the ' General Re- 
pository.' I suppose I need have no hesitation in stating, 
what was then generally recognized, that in this work the 
tone of opposition to the prevailing doctrines of Orthodoxy 
was more explicit, decided, and fundamental than had been 
common among us. The first article in the volume, entitled 
' A Defence of Liberal Christianity,' was written by myself. 
Mr. Buckminster expressed to me, on his own part, no dis- 
satisfaction with its sentiments, but told me of a remark made 
on it by our common friend, Mr. Vaughan of Hallowell, the 
pupil and friend of Dr. Priestley, — that it reminded him of 
what the English Unitarians had been called, namely, ' the 
sect of the Imprudents.' For one who should read it now, 
with only a knowledge of the present state of religious opin- 
ion and feeling in our country, it might be difficult to discover 
why the writer should be thought to belong to the sect of 
the Imprudents. But, in 1809, Mr. Buckminster had said, 
in a letter to Mr. Belsham, (published in Williams's Life of 
Belsham,) ' Do you wish to know any thing of American 
theology ? I can only tell you, that, except in the small 
town of Boston and its vicinity, there cannot be collected, 
from a space of one hundred miles, six clergymen who 
have any conceptions of rational theology, and who would 
not shrink from the suspicion of Antitrinitarianism in any 
shape.' 

" But the publication of the General Repository soon failed 
for want of support. It was too bold for the proper pru- 
dence, or the worldly caution, or for the actual convictions, 
of a large portion of the liberal party. Mr. Channing, in 
a defence of those who were then among us beginning to be 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 9 

called Unitarians, in his ' Letter to Mr. Thacher,' pub- 
lished in 1815, said of it, 'As to the General Repository, I 
never for a moment imagined that its editor was constituted 
or acknowledged as the organ of his brethren ; and, while its 
high literary merit has been allowed, I have heard some of 
its sentiments disapproved by a majority of those with whom 
I conversed.' When, in 1819, I was elected Professor of 
Biblical Criticism, the President of the College, Dr. Kirk- 
land, informed me that Mr. Channing, who was then a mem- 
ber of its Corporation, was willing to assign me the duties 
and the salary of the office, but objected to giving me the 
title of Professor on account of the injury it might be to the 
College to make so conspicuous its connection w^ith one hold- 
ing such opinions as mine. 

" Its decided character, however, was not the only obstacle 
to the success of the Greneral Repository. It was overbur- 
dened with learning, or with what passed for learning among 
us, out of proportion to the amount of theological knowledge, 
or interest in such knowledge, which existed among its read- 
ers. I gave in it an account of the controversy between 
Dr. Priestley and Dr. Horsley, the fame of which had not 
then died out ; and this was continued through several num- 
bers. Dr. Kirkland, with his usual happiness in giving 
advice indirectly, told me that people said ' I was writing 
what nobody but myself understood.' Still an effort was 
made by its friends to promote its circulation. In 1813, a 
recommendation of it (unsolicited by me) was published as 
a circular, bearing the signatures of five of the most respect- 
able laymen of Boston. But it was not thought advisable 
that any clergyman should sign it. 

" The facts which I have stated, few as they are, may 
throw some light on the oppressive bigotry which at that time 
prevailed among us. I am tempted to add another proof. 



10 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

A passage comes to my recollection of a lecture which I de- 
livered in the College Chapel, about the year 1816 (I cannot 
fix the precise date). I have looked it up in the manuscript, 
and find it to be to this effect : — 

" ' Whatever an ill man believes,' says Jeremy Taylor, 
' if he therefore ^believes it because it serves his own ends, 
be his belief true or false, the man hath an heretical mind ; 
for, to serve his own ends, his mind is prepared to believe a 
lie. But a good man, that believes what, according to his 
light and the use of his moral industry, he thinks true, 
whether he hits upon the right or no, because he hath a mind 
desirous of truth, and prepared to believe every truth, is 
therefore acceptable to God ; because nothing hindered him 
from it but what he could not help,^ his misery and his weak- 
ness, — which being imperfections merely natural, which God 
never punishes, he stands fair for a blessing of his morality, 
which God always accepts.' This is admirable. — But it is 
melancholy to think, that we have so long been accustomed 
to nothing but what is bigoted and narrow and irrational on 
the subject of religion, that we feel delight in the expression 
of any generous or manly sentiment, though it be nothing 
but the most obvious truth. We are like those who have 
been so long confined within the walls of a prison, that they 
are filled with emotion at being restored to the common light 
and air. 

" When we consider that it would be an absurdity too gross 
to be imagined, for one among us at the present day to de- 
liver in a lecture the concluding remarks on the passage 
from Taylor, we may comprehend what a vast change has 
taken place since they were written. 

" I some time since observed a passage in a note by 
Mr. W. H. Channing to the Preface to his Memoir of 
his uncle, in which he says, that, in a sketch which he 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 11 

had written ' of the rise and progress of the Unitarian 
cont]joversy,' but forbore to publish, ' the rightful posi- 
tion was assigned to the General Repository, as the ad- 
vance-guard of Unitarianism proper." What he meant by 
the words ' Unitarianism proper ' I do not understand ; 
nor do I conceive him to have had any distinct meaning 
in his own mind. No work, in opposition to what its writer 
regarded as prevailing errors concerning religion, could 
have less connection than the Repository with any thing that 
may be called ' Unitarianism proper,' unless by this term be 
meant simply Antitrinitarianism, — a sense which, as appears 
from the connection in which it stands, could not reasonably 
be intended. The common use of the words * Unitarians ' 
and 'Unitarianism,' to denote a sect and the opinions of 
that sect, was, I think, introduced among those who had 
before been called 'liberal Christians,' by Mr. Channing, 
through his Letter to Mr. Thacher, published in 1815. The 
Orthodox had endeavored to fix that name on liberal Chris- 
tians invidiously, for the purpose of confounding them with 
the English Unitarians of that time, and of making them 
responsible for all the speculations of members of that body. 
Mr. Channing, though recognizing it as an ambiguous term, 
and remonstrating against the use made of it by the Orthodox, 
and carefully defining that by Unitarianism he meant only 
Antitrinitarianism, yet adopted the appellation as the distinct- 
ive name of those in whose defence he was writing. In a 
note to this Letter, he explains that he regarded the name 
' liberal Christians ' as too assuming ; ' because the word lib- 
erality expresses the noblest qualities of the human mind.' 
That name, however, had been familiarly applied by the 
Orthodox to their opponents, without any intention either of 
complimenting them or of sneering at them. 
" The name ' Unitarian ' gradually became prevalent among 



12 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

us, and those by whom it was assumed combined into a sect. 
They thus quitted the high ground on which they had stood, 
or might have stood, in company with the good and wise, 
the philosophers of different ages and different denominations, 
— with such men as Erasmus, and Grotius, and Locke, and 
Le Clerc, who, according to their light, opposed the relig- 
ious errors prevailing round them, and were ' the liberal 
Christians ' of their day. They exchanged this for a connec- 
tion with the English Unitarians as they then existed ; and, 
notwithstanding the credit conferred on that sect by the emi- 
nent talents and great virtues of Priestley, and the sturdy 
honesty of Belsham, this connection was an unfortunate one. 
They were obliged continually to explain, that they were not 
to be held responsible, either for the metaphysical doctrines, 
or for many of the religious sentiments, of its more conspic- 
uous members, — that they agreed with them xDnly in being 
Antitrinitarians. There are times in which religious truth is 
exposed to particular persecution and obloquy, when it may 
be well for its defenders to combine into a sect for mutual 
encouragement and support. But the pressure from without 
must be great to render it advisable. The combination 
implied in the formation of a religious sect at the present 
day, with a distinctive name, is attended with great evils. 
It is, however, favored by many, through their love of sym- 
pathy, and from the excitement of party feeling, or because, 
as members or zealots of a sect, they may attain to a 
consideration which, standing alone, they could not possess. 
But religious truth, the great means of improving the con- 
dition of mankind, is not to be ascertained and made effica- 
cious through the combination of men into religious parties, 
though its influence may be greatly impeded by such com- 
binations. 

" The name of ' Unitarians,' to whatever honor it had 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 13 

been raised by the persecuted ' Polish Brotherhood,' the 
Fratres Poloni, in the seventeenth century, was an unfortu- 
nate name to be assumed in the beginning of the nineteenth 
by a sect among us. It was explained as denoting merely a 
disbelief of the doctrine of the Trinity, and as including all 
(that is, as was then meant, all Christians) who rejected that 
doctrine, whatever might be their differences of opinion 
respecting the language of Scripture which has been sup- 
posed to relate to it. But, were Christian sects at the present 
day to be founded at all, it must be bad to found them on 
disbelief, and especially, as in the present case, on the dis- 
belief of a particular doctrine, — that of the Trinity. It is 
giving this doctrine a solitary place of preeminence among a 
multitude of other errors all linked together, and some of 
them equally, or even far more, disastrous. The ill conse- 
quences of a name of such indefinite comprehensiveness, and 
so easily abused, when this name is assumed by a religious 
party, were not at once perceived. But they have become 
conspicuous. When a Unitarian was first spoken of among 
us, a unitarian Christian, as I have said, was meant. But 
the adjunct ' unitarian ' has succeeded, to a great extent, in 
dispossessing the substantive ' Christian ' of its power ; and 
the Christian Unitarians among us have in consequence 
found themselves brought into strange fellowship with un- 
believers and pantheists. 

" But I am unwilhng to conclude with the few sentences 
last written. What is now wanting to the progress and in- 
fluence of rational religion among us is a revival of the feel- 
ing of the importance of religious truth, — a practical con- 
viction of the fact, which, however obvious and indisputable, 
does not seem to be generally recognized, that it is only by 
religious truth that religious errors, with all their attendant 
evils, can be done away ; and of a fact equally obvious, that, 
2 



14 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 

in the present conflict of opinions, minds disciplined in habits 
of correct reasoning and informed by extensive learning, 
minds acquainted with the different branches of theological 
science, which embraces or touches upon all the higher and 
more important subjects of thought, are required for the at- 
tainment and communication of religious truth. In one 
word, it is learned and able theologians that are wanted, ^r~ 
such men as Mr. Buckminster." 



A DEFENCE 



LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 



Among Protestant Christians there are two 
principal parties, which have been denominated 
with no great propriety of language the ortho- 
dox and the liberal. Between such, however, 
as may be decisively ranked in either party, the 
whole interval is filled by men, whose different 
opinions, some more resembling those of the 
one side, and some those of the other, may sup- 
ply every shade in the gradation. But, though 
the limits of neither division can be accurately 
defined, and though in each are comprehended 
men who differ much in belief and sentiments 
from one another, yet there are some general 
characteristics of each division, which are suffi- 
ciently distinguishable. Those are to be con- 
sidered as liberal Christians, who believe that 
Christianity, in respect to its main design, is a 



16 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

revelation from God ; a revelation of religious 
truths beyond all comparison more important 
and interesting, than what unenlightened rea- 
son can Avith any approach to certainty dis- 
cover; a revelation of the being and moral 
government of God, of the immortality of 
man, of the purpose of the present life, of 
the character here to be formed, and of our 
condition in a future state as depending on 
our present conduct. There are many, indeed, 
to be considered as liberal Christians, v^ho, be- 
lieving that Christianity is in its main design a 
revelation, do yet believe that there are other 
important purposes of this dispensation. The 
orthodox, on the contrary, do not consider 
Christianity in respect to its principal purpose 
as a revelation of any kind, but as a scheme 
by which mankind, created with natures so 
corrupt as never to perform the will of God, 
and therefore justly exposed to his wrath and 
the severest punishments, and utterly impotent 
to do any thing to deliver themselves from this 
condition, are now, through the sufferings and 
death of Christ, put into such a state, that the 
mercy^of God is offered to all and extended to 
some individuals. They believe that these 
views of human nature and of Christianity 
were taught by Christ and his Apostles together 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 17 

with other doctrines, some of them mysterious 
and incomprehensible, which are not to be 
examined by the principles of natural reason, 
but in the reception of which our reason is to 
humble itself before our faith; and they for 
the most part consider the reception of these 
doctrines as essential, — as being the only foun- 
dation of the Christian character. The modes 
of interpretation which these two classes of 
Christians apply to the Scriptures likewise 
form characteristic differences. The orthodox, 
believing the writings of the Evangelists and 
Apostles to have been composed under God's 
immediate and miraculous superintendence, for 
the immediate purpose of being used and easir 
ly understood by all Christians in all couur 
tries and in all ages, of course apply to writ- 
ings of so peculiar a character a mode of inter- 
pretation very different from what is applied to 
any other. They believe that no allowance is 
to be made for the inadvertence of the writer, 
and none for the exaggeration produced by 
strong feelings. They pay but little attention 
to that use of language, common in all human 
compositions, according to which the insulated 
meaning of words is not to be considered, and 
their true meaning is that which is defined by 
their connection, by some other known circum- 



18 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

stance, or by the reason of the thing. They 
do not expect to find the meaning much dis- 
guised by peculiarities of expression charac- 
teristic of the writer, or of the age or country 
to which he belonged ; they pay but little re- 
gard to the circumstances in which he wrote, 
or to those of the persons whom he addressed ; 
and they are not ready to believe that writings, 
expressly intended for the general use of all 
Christians, should be much occupied by contro- 
versies which prevailed only in the first ages 
of the Church. Liberal Christians, on the 
contrary, believe that attention should be paid 
to all these particulars ; and, while they regard 
the Christian Scriptures as the writings of men 
instructed by Christ himself, or by immediate 
revelation, in the nature and design of Chris- 
tianity, they yet consider that the same modes 
of criticism and explanation are to be applied 
to these Scriptures as to all other ancient writ- 
ings. 

The two classes of Christians of which we 
speak regard each other with different feelings, 
partly from the very nature of their opposite 
opinions, and partly, perhaps, from the temper 
and disposition, or from the habits of thinking 
and investigation, which may in the one and in 
the other lead to the adoption of these opin- 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 19 

ions. A liberal Christian is disposed fully to 
acknowledge the piety, the religious earnest- 
ness, and the services to God and man, of some 
of his opponents. However erroneous he may 
think their religious opinions, he has no dispo- 
sition to call in question their motives or their 
sincerity. But he will hardly expect in return, 
that even such men should be able very fairly 
to estimate, or ready very warmly to praise, the 
at least equal virtues of some of those who 
think very differently from them. 

Various charges have of course been brought 
against liberal Christians, some of which it is 
our intention to examine. The first we shall 
notice is, that, if our opinions be true, Chris- 
tianity is something of small value ; that it re- 
veals nothing but what might be discovered, 
and what had been discovered, by unassisted rea- 
son ; that the heathen philosophers had correct 
notions of God and a belief of a future state ; 
and that it is not supposable that God should 
make a revelation merely for the purpose of 
teaching what he had enabled us by our nat- 
ural faculties to discover. To this objection it 
may be replied, that there is a very great dif- 
ference between believing certain truths to be 
the most important principles of action, truths 
which ought to influence and regulate the 



20 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

whole of life, and this upon evidence which 
leaves no painful uncertainty, and considering 
the same truths merely as speculative opinions, 
for which it would be a very pleasant thing to 
find evidence, and in favor of which we may 
think there is an over-balance of probabilities. 
This was the state of some of the ancient 
philosophers in respect to the doctrine of a 
future life. With regard to the unity and 
character of God, we believe that not much 
is to be found in what they have left us of 
their opinions, which, when properly under- 
stood, may be brought to prove that they had 
a correct idea of one supreme and infinite 
Being. But these are points which in relation 
to our present purpose are not worth contest- 
ing. If it could be maintained, that the an- 
cient philosophers had as correct notions can- 
cerning God, the future state, and man's im- 
mortality, as we may derive from Christianity, 
still the value of our religion would not, in our 
view, be sensibly diminished. Before this can 
be done, it must be proved that the doctrine of 
a future state of retribution had some consider- 
able influence, we do not say on the generality 
of men before the introduction of Christianity, 
but on the generality of men in the most en- 
lightened heathen nations ; it must be proved 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 21 

that this principle was a motive and a restraint, 
regulating their course of life in a considerable 
proportion of men ; it must be proved, not that 
there were a few solitary individuals who had 
correct notions of God, which they did not 
dare publicly to communicate (we are not now 
ready to believe that there were such individ- 
uals) ; not that correct notions of God any- 
where generally prevailed (we do not ask for the 
proof of any thing so absurd as this) ; but that 
there was some considerable hope, some reason- 
able expectation, that such notions would gen- 
erally prevail without the aid of revelation. 
When these things are proved, and when we 
are further convinced, that the effects of Chris- 
tianity, considered as a revelation, have been 
much less than we now estimate them, and 
that there is no such vast difference as we be- 
lieve between those nations where it now pre- 
vails with some approach to its proper in- 
fluence, and the most civilized nations of an- 
tiquity ; or that this difference is to be ascribed 
principally to some other cause than the recep- 
tion of those doctrines, the teaching of which 
we regard as its essential purpose ; when we 
consider all this as established, we may then 
doubt, not of the truth of Christianity, but of 
the inestimable value we now assign to it. 



22 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL GHRISTIANITY. 

The end of all religion is to make men bet- 
ter. Now there is no motive which can be 
compared, in its influence upon the moral con- 
duct of men, with the belief of a future state of 
rewards and punishments. Where this exists, 
it gives strength and efficacy to every other 
proper principle ; and, where it is wanting, no 
great effects are to be expiected from SitLj other 
motive of a moral or religious nature. It is a 
motive, which is alike applicable to the minds 
of all men ; but it can only be brought to act 
upon the minds of men, when it rests for sup- 
port on express revelation. If, therefore, the 
disclosure of this future state had been its sin- 
gle purpose, we do not think that Christianity 
would have been at all unworthy of all that 
ceremony of preparation in the^ Jewish econo- 
my by which it was preceded, and of all that 
splendor of miracles by which its descent on 
earth was accompanied. We do not think 
that even this single purpose would have been 
unworthy of his mission, one of whose last and 
most solemn declarations concerning himself 
was, " To this end was I born, and for this 
cause came I into the world, that I should bear 
witness to the Truth." 

We proceed to notice another charge against 
liberal Christians similar to the one we have 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 23 

been considering. It has been said, that there 
is no difference between them and a sober and 
rational infidel, who believes the being, the 
providence, and moral government of God, and 
a future state ; such a one, for instance, as Lord 
Herbert of Cherbury. To this it may be re- 
plied, in the first place, that such instances are 
rare ; and that the reception of what we regard 
as the doctrines of revelation is not often to be 
met with, unconnected with the reception of 
revelation itself. Lord Herbert was an extra? 
ordinary man, a man forced off and driven 
away from Christianity by what we consider as 
the corruptions by which in his time it was 
surrounded. If, however, there be any man, 
who has honestly sought after the truth with- 
out finding it, and who, relying upon natural 
religion alone, has devoted himself to the love 
and service of God, and trusts in his mercy, 
and looks forward to immortality, --^ if there 
he any such man, we are not solicitous to 
point out distinctions between him and our- 
selves, for the purpose of showing that he 
has less reason than we have to hope for 
the mercy of our common Father. But we 
do not mean to dismiss the objection with 
this answer. That there is no difference be? 
tween a liberal Christian and * an unbeliever. 



24 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

is one of those loose and undefined proposi- 
tions, whose want of truth may not be per- 
ceived by him who urges it, on account of 
its indistinctness of meaning. If it be meant, 
that there is no difference in respect to moral 
goodness, and that the rejection of the peculiar 
doctrines of our opponents is as culpable as the 
rejection of Christianity, we may assent to 
this, when we are convinced, first, that these 
doctrines are true ; next, that their evidence 
is as clear and satisfactory as that of revelation 
itself; and, lastly, that they are in the highest 
degree important, so as to make the obligation 
as binding, on all those who doubt, to ex- 
amine their evidence, as to examine that of 
revelation. If it be meant, that an unbeliever 
may receive what we consider the great prin- 
ciples of religion with such an assent as to pro- 
duce in him as strong dispositions to perform 
his duty to God and man as exist in any liberal 
Christian, we answer, that in the present state 
of light and knowledge we do not think it a 
probable case; but if it be a supposable one, 
it is likewise supposable, that such an unbe- 
liever should in this respect be on an equality 
with an orthodox Christian ; and that for our- 
selves, to take the example which may be 
brought against us, we do not think that Lord 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 25 

Herbert was inferior in Christian charity to 
Calvin, or in truth and honesty to Beza, or in 
real piety and holiness to either. If it be 
meant, and this seems to be the only meaning 
which remains, that there are no essential dif- 
ferences of belief between a rational unbeliever 
and a liberal Christian ; we answer, that there 
is at first sight a difference, which in the age of 
the Apostles was considered essential, that the 
one " confesses with his mouth the Lord Jesus, 
and believes in his heart that God raised him 
from the dead," and that the other makes no 
such confession and has no such belief; we an- 
swer, that there is a most important difference 
between him who believes that Christianity is 
a revelation from heaven, together with all the 
consequences of this belief, and him who con- 
siders it as a system of fraud and folly, and 
admits all the consequences of this opinion ; 
between him who believes Jesus Christ to have 
been a messenger from God, and to have given 
by far the highest example of moral excellence 
ever exhibited to mankind, and him who has 
at best no definite notions respecting his char- 
acter, and who can with reason and consistency 
regard him as nothing better than an impostor 
or enthusiast ; between him who believes that 
God has never ceased to manifest his care for 

3 



26 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

men, and that, by various dispensations adapted 
to the different ages of the world, he has been 
preserving the knowledge of himself, and pre- 
paring them for his final dispensation of Chris- 
tianity, and him who believes that God has 
cast the world from his hand and left us to 
ourselves, to the guidance of that reason which 
is so easily deceived, so various and opposite 
in its decisions, so weak to enforce its dictates, 
and which, without the assistance of revela- 
tion, is so full of hesitation and uncertainty 
upon our most important concerns. 

But we are accused, to proceed to another 
charge, of being remiss and indifferent in our 
regard to religion. If it be so, it is not the 
fault of our principles. With him to whom 
our religion affords no motives to holiness, and 
no objects to interest and elevate his affections, 
all motives and all objects must be in vain. 
There can be none more interesting, there can 
be none higher and more awful. 

There is, indeed, a display of regard for 
religion, sometimes ostentatious, and some- 
times offensive, which we believe is much 
more rarely to be found in liberal Christians 
than in others. But he must have little ac- 
quaintance with human nature, who does not 
know that the affectation of any virtue is one of 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 27 

the worst proofs of its existence. It is not 
common for a man of humanity and benevo- 
lence to talk much of his humane and benevo- 
lent feelings, nor for a man of courage to 
assume the air of a braggart, nor for a man of 
honesty and truth to make professions of his 
honesty and assertions of his veracity. The 
case in respect to religion is indeed somewhat 
different from what it is in respect to the social 
virtues ; as it is not so strongly as these sup- 
ported by the opinion of the world. It becomes, 
therefore, the duty of men of virtue and in- 
fluence, a duty very different from that ostenta- 
tious display of which we have been speaking, 
openly to profess their respect for it, and on 
various occasions of life in a particular manner 
to manifest this respect. In the performance 
of this duty we do not know that liberal Chris- 
tians can be charged with being less faithful 
than others. 

But we do not, it has been said, make re- 
ligion a common subject of conversation. By 
this we understand to be meant, not that we 
refrain from conversing about its evidences, its 
doctrines, or the subjects of critical inquiry 
connected with it, in society where such sub- 
jects may properly be introduced ; but that we 
do not discourse about our religious feelings 



28 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTLiNITY. 

and affections, and concerning the truths of re- 
ligion with particular application to ourselves 
or those with whom we are conversing. To 
this we answer, that there are subjects not 
to be talked of except in a very serious state 
of mind, and with an immediate sense of 
their importance ; and that we do not think 
the hours of innocent gaiety and relaxation 
the most proper time for the introduction 
of such subjects. There would be much 
danger of their losing their solemnity and 
their awfulness, if too frequently or familiarly 
introduced. It is offensive to a man of correct 
mind to make his deepest feelings and his 
strongest affections a subject of common dis- 
course, to borrow the fire of the altar for the 
common uses of life. He who commanded us 
to enter into our closets to pray, did not intend 
that we should come forth to announce with 
what dispositions we may have performed the 
duty. For that man, therefore, we should feel 
the highest respect, whose conversation should 
be habitually regulated by religion and morali- 
ty ; who should imply his sense of their obli- 
gations much oftener than he directly ex- 
pressed it; who should be always ready to 
converse on those subjects which require the 
most serious state of mind, when his advice, his 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 29 

warnings, his encouragement, or his consola- 
tion might be of any value ; but who for the 
most part in the common intercourse of life 
should " silent let his morals tell his mind." 

Before it is attempted to confound liberal 
Christians with unbelievers, and before they are 
accused of indifference to Christianity, it may 
be worth while to inquire, who have been its 
most able and satisfactory advocates. There 
are none who in this respect are to be placed 
in the same rank with Grotius, Butler, Lard- 
ner, Paley, and Priestley. With regard to 
Bishop Butler, we do not mean to quote his 
authority in support of our belief, nor do we 
feel the less respect for his character because 
we do not assent to all his opinions. If his 
name should be denied us, however, it cannot 
be claimed by our opponents. We believe that 
his works are read and their high value felt by 
none more than by liberal Christians ; and this 
could not be, if his views of religion in what is 
most essential and important were different 
from theirs. With regard to the others whom 
w^e have mentioned, we suppose there will be 
little dispute respecting the class in which 
they are to be reckoned. 

We have no doubt, that what we consider 
the corruptions of Christianity are the cause of 
3* 



30 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

unbelief in some, and of indifference and inat- 
tention to religion in many. There are those, 
who, partially feeling the force of the evidences 
of our religion, are unable to reconcile them- 
selves to what have been taught them as its 
doctrines, and, having never properly examined 
any other views of it, do in a great measure 
dismiss the subject from their minds. Our op- 
ponents will call this the dislike of corrupt 
human nature to the truth ; we shall call it the 
repulsion of our reason and our natural feel- 
ings to their doctrines. These men, whom 
their doctrines have thus alienated from Chris- 
tianity, we wish to reconcile to our religion, 
and make rational and consistent Christians ; 
but for their indifference, or their infidelity, we 
are not accountable. 

Another charge against liberal Christians is, 
that they reduce religion to a mere system of 
morals, that they teach and regard as essential 
nothing more than a worldly and pagan mo- 
rality. If it be true, that we teach morality, 
and regard it as essential, it is praise which we 
shall not willingly relinquish. It is true, that 
we have no respect for that religion, which, 
where the means of doing good exist, does not 
manifest itself in a life of usefulness; which 
does not prompt to continual exertion, not to 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 31 

any violent and irregular star tings off from our 
proper sphere, for the purpose of some extra- 
ordinary course of action, which the world may 
wonder at, but to a patient, regular, faithful, 
unostentatious discharge of daily, and it may be 
humble duties. The religion which we re- 
spect does not produce any temporary, un- 
natural excitement of feelings, which may, or 
may not, have a very little to do with personal 
holiness ; but it forms habits of virtue and self- 
control, it restrains the passions, it regulates 
the temper, and it produces throughout the 
whole character a gradual but constant prog- 
ress in excellence. It has no sectarian air, 
no habitual look of gloom and repulsion, no 
assuming of censorship and superiority; but 
it mingles in the world, and sheds a beneficial 
and improving influence on all around, and 
regulates in its possessor, either directly or as 
a more remote principle, all his actions toward 
his fellow-creatures. 

It is true, also, that we regard with thorough 
dislike the manner in which a virtuous and 
religious life, or, to use language that, how- 
ever proper in itself, may recall the barbarous 
jargon of technical theology, in which good 
works are spoken of in the creeds of Calvinism 
and in the writings of men of this belief. We 



32 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

think, that the sentiments to which we refer in 
these creeds and writings are not less hostile 
to morality, than the doctrines with which they 
are connected are injurious to religion. There 
is nothing to which our irregular passions will 
not sooner submit, than to the uniform observ- 
ance of those rules of piety and virtue, which 
never intermit their authority, and never relax 
their obligation ; but there is no difficulty in 
forming an alliance between religion and the 
passions, if the former can be understood as not 
directly connected with this observance. One 
cause of the prevalence of almost all the cor- 
ruptions of Christianity is the desire to substi- 
tute something else instead of personal holi- 
ness; to make something different from this 
the foundation of our hope of God's mercy. 
To this cause we may attribute the penances, 
pilgrimages, ceremonies, and indulgences of the 
Eomish church, which have been made substi- 
tutes for a good life ; and to the same indispo- 
sition to consider this as essential we may as- 
cribe, in a considerable degree, the doctrines of 
imputed sin and imputed righteousness, of a 
nature thoroughly corrupt, during whose ex- 
istence we can perform no good action, and of 
its miraculous renovation, after which we can- 
not finally fall away, and, above all, the manner 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTLiNITY. 33 

of speaking before referred to, respecting a vir- 
tuous life. Let us not, however, be misunder- 
stood. We do not confound the general cause 
of the prevalence of certain doctrines with the 
particular cause of their reception by many in- 
dividuals, nor the natural tendency of those 
doctrines with their actual operation. We 
have no doubt that there are Catholics and 
Calvinists who w^ould insist strongly on the 
necessity of habitual virtue. 

These views of religion and of the doctrines 
of Calvinism are what probably have given 
occasion to the charge we are noticing, which 
is made, we suppose, with very little attention 
to its force or meaning. If there be any one 
who seriously thinks it true, — w^ho thinks that 
we regard no other duties than those of man 
to man, and rely on no other motives to virtue 
than what the present life aifords ; that we be- 
lieve in God with somewhat more delightful 
views, we suppose it must be confessed, of his 
nature and moral government, than what many 
other Christians entertain, and yet regard him 
with no love, nor reverence, nor fear, and do 
not make this belief the foundation of all vir- 
tue and of all hope; that we believe Jesus 
Christ to have been the messenger of God, and 
yet view his perfect character with no admira- 



34: DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

tion, and his labors and sufferings with no 
gratitude; that we believe in a future life of 
happiness and misery, and yet regard its most 
awful sanctions with indifference ; — if there be 
any one who thinks all this true, we suppose 
no attempt could be more hopeless, than the 
attempt to undeceive him. 

But, to notice another charge, it is said that 
we deprive religion of all its doctrines which 
may give joy or consolation, that our principles 
afford no hope in life and no comfort in death. 
Some doctrines we reject, which we should 
think not fruitful of joy and consolation, and 
which we believe have driven many persons 
sincerely good to gloom and despondency, 
and some to melancholy and madness ; and 
such consequences we should suppose they 
would naturally produce, we do not say in 
a common mind, but in a mind of sensibili- 
ty, of proper affections, and in the habit of 
thinking seriously on religious subjects. If it 
be thought, however, that our views of the 
present condition of men are little adapted to 
promote happiness or virtue, we may compare 
them with those to which they are opposed. 
We believe that man is a being possessed of 
powers, which he may abuse, and which it is 
morally impossible that he should not in some 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 35 

instances abuse, before he has formed habits 
of exercising them aright; and of passions, 
whose natural tendency to excess is to be re- 
strained by experiencing the ill effects of this 
excess in himself, or witnessing them in others. 
We believe that his highest happiness consists 
in the right exercise of these powers, and the 
proper indulgence of some of these passions. 
Of this highest happiness, therefore, he is of 
course incapable, till he has formed habits of 
virtue, that is, of properly exercising his 
powers, and habits of self-control, that is, of 
properly restraining his passions. For the 
formation of these habits, we believe the pres- 
ent life to be a state of discipline admirably 
adapted. If these habits be here formed, we 
believe that he will be removed to a better 
state of existence, adapted to his improved 
nature, where we think it is the doctrine of 
reason and of revelation, that his faculties will 
be continually enlarging, and new objects be 
continually presented to his intellect and his 
affections. If, on the contrary, habits of irreg- 
ularity and vice be formed, he cannot be happy. 
The whole order of nature must first be re- 
versed. As to his future state, we leave it in 
the same terrible uncertainty in which it is 
left by revelation. Now to this view, which 



36 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

represents all men as made capable of obtain- 
ing, through the mercy and love of their com- 
mon Father, eternal blessedness, and made 
capable of continual progress in happiness 
and virtue, what is opposed so much more 
joyful and consolatory '? A scheme before 
noticed, which represents all mankind, since 
our first parents, as created by God with na- 
tures so corrupt as to be able to do nothing 
to save themselves from eternal misery. We 
use the mildest language possible ; that of the 
creeds and confessions is, that mankind are 
under " God's displeasure and curse ; so as we 
are by nature children of wrath, bond-slaves to 
Satan, and justly liable to all punishments in 
this world and that which is to come. And 
the punishments in the world to come are ever- 
lasting separation from the comfortable pres- 
ence of God and most grievous torments in 
soul and body without intermission in hell-fire 
for ever." * From this terrible condition a part 
of mankind are saved through the atonement 
of Christ. They are chosen from among the 
rest, not because they are better than those 
who are left, nor with reference to any works 
or endeavors of their own, but out of God's 

* Westminster Assembly's Larger Catechism. 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 37 

mere good pleasure. We give the doctrine of 
the creeds ; some may choose to affirm that 
this election. is not with any certain and natu- 
ral reference to their own endeavors, but may 
shrink from the assertion of more hardy ortho- 
doxy, that good actions performed by unregen- 
erate men are sinful.* Those who are thus cho- 
sen are mad6 regenerate, that is, their natures 
undergo a miraculous renovation, and they be- 
come fit for heaven. Those who are left perish 
everlastingly, without possibility of escape. We 
shall make no comment upon this scheme, nor 
urge the comparison that we have mentioned. 
We will only observe, that we suppose there 
are some men, who receive what is most essen- 
tial in it, who yet may be shocked at the horri- 
ble absurdity of language in which parts of it 
are sometimes expressed. Let such men define 
their notions, and see how far they do in fact 
difibr from the original doctrines. 

But it may be said, that he, who, according 
to the scheme just mentioned, believes, or, as 
some will have it, knows, himself to be one 
of the elect, must have a much more joyful 
confidence in God's peculiar love and mercy, 

* Good actions, that is to say, " works that for the matter of 
them may be things which God commands, and of good use both 
to themselves and others." — Westminster Assembly's Confession 
of Faith, Ch. XVI. § 7. 
4 



38 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

than any one can enjoy upon our principles. 
It may be so. The best of us can have no 
more confidence than what the author of the 
Epistle to the Hebrews possessed, and can only 
say with him, " We trust we have a good con- 
science." We can have no more assurance than 
St. Paul enjoyed, when he told the Corinthians 
of his care " lest by any means, after having 
preached to others, he himself should become a 
castaway." We can have no other confidence 
than what arises from the testimony of our 
consciences, and a perfect trust in the impartial 
mercy of God ; and, if there be those who pos- 
sess any other, we think it built on a very fal- 
lacious foundation, and suppose that it is for the 
most part somewhat wavering and uncertain. 

If our religion be the guide of our life, we 
have no fear that she will desert us in its trials 
and sorrows, or that her aid will be ineftectual 
for our support. The companion of our pros- 
perity will make adversity a lesson of virtue, 
and enable us to bear it with resignation, and 
perhaps with cheerfulness. And in that hour 
when we shall have no other support, and no 
other availing comforter, she will not fail us. 
Through her influence the visions of immortali- 
ty, to which in life she has directed our eyes, 
will grow brighter and more distinct around 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 39 

our death-bed, as all other objects are receding. 
We have no envy for him who can speak of 
her as v^anting in joy, or poor in consolation. 
We desire only, that we may be more worthy 
of her joys and consolations, and feel a more 
profound gratitude to Him from whom she has 
descended. 

But, whatever may be the character or the 
influence of our opinions, it is still further 
urged against us, that these opinions are sup- 
ported by unnatural constructions of Scripture, 
by rejecting the plain sense and substituting a 
forced meaning in its place. If by the plain 
sense of the Scriptures be meant that which 
would first occur to a person educated in the 
belief of certain doctrines, which liberal Chris- 
tians consider no part of Christianity, and read- 
ing them in an English translation without any 
knowledge of the original language, or any col- 
lateral learning to assist in the right under- 
standing of them, then, as to a considerable 
part of the Scriptures, the charge is to be ad- 
mitted. Whether or not it will be a very seri- 
ous one is a further question ; and whether or 
not this should be considered the plain sense 
of Scripture depends in a considerable degree 
on the decision of the question, which of the 
two modes of interpretation formerly mentioned 



40 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

is preferable. To one reading the Scriptures 
in the manner we have mentioned, an unjusti- 
fiable construction may appear to be put upon 
many passages, which have long been forced 
into the support of theological systems, when 
they are only restored to their true and natural 
meaning. But, supposing it to be granted that 
the Christian Scriptures are to be studied in 
the same manner as all other ancient writings, 
and that a variety of ancient learning is to be 
brought to their elucidation, a knowledge of 
Jewish and heathen antiquities, of the language 
in which they were written, and of this lan- 
guage as affected by the modes of Oriental and 
Jewish phraseology, of Jewish opinions, of the 
controversies which prevailed in the time of the 
Apostles, and of all those other circumstances 
which may tend to explain the general design 
of the different writings and the particular 
meaning of single passages ; — granting that 
this is to be done, if then it be affirmed, that 
we reject what in this mode of study may ap- 
pear the plain sense of Scripture, we deny the 
charge. But we do more ; we contend that our 
opinions are supported by the plain sense and 
the general tenor of Scripture, such as it will 
appear to the most illiterate, if at the same 
time he be an unprejudiced reader. "We con- 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 41 

tend, that the doctrines of our opponents are 
contradicted by the general meaning of Scrip- 
ture, and are apparently supported only by a 
few detached passages. Let us take, for ex- 
ample, that doctrine which places Jesus Christ 
on an equality with the God and Father of us 
all. By the removal of a very few passages 
we might leave a volume not sensibly dimin- 
ished in bulk, in no part of which would this 
doctrine find any support, and to many parts 
of which it would appear altogether contradic- 
tory. If we take, for another example, the 
doctrine of the total impotence of man and 
irresistible grace, we may go through the New 
Testament, and, with not many strokes of the 
pen blotting out every passage in which it can 
be pretended that this doctrine finds support, 
we shall leave a body of doctrines, and pre- 
cepts, and promises, and exhortations, and 
threatenings, to which it will appear wholly 
irreconcilable. It is in the explanation of 
those difiicult and perverted passages which 
seem to give countenance to such doctrines, 
difficult because they have been so long per- 
verted, that one of the principal uses of the 
critical study of the Scriptures consists. 

But it may be further objected, that, if we 
are in the right, the Church, the great ma- 



42 DEFENCE OF LlBERxiL CHRISTIANITY. 

jority of Christians, has been for ages in er- 
ror. Be it so. For how many ages, we may 
ask in reply, has the Church been confessedly 
in error '? Will any Protestant pretend, that 
Christianity existed among the great majority 
of Christians in any degree of purity from the 
end of the fourth century to the Reformation, a 
period of a thousand years 1 During this long 
period the articles of belief taught and received 
for its doctrines were such, as show to what de- 
basement and prostration the human mind may 
be reduced, and how entirely the resistance of 
reason to any modes of faith may be subdued. 
During this period the superstitions of pagan- 
ism were reinstated under other names in the 
temples of God. The proper influence of 
Christianity could not be wholly prevented, nor 
could its restoring power, its tendency to revive 
and purify itself, be at any time entirely hin- 
dered from acting ; but its authority was falsi- 
fied to minister to public and private wicked- 
ness ; the religion of humility, benevolence, 
and purity was represented as being in league 
with ambition, cruelty, and lust, and affording 
them her support. During all this period the 
light of the moral world was " in dim eclipse, 
shedding disastrous twilight." For so long a 
time, at least, the authority of the Church is 
not of value enough to be urged against us. 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 43 

We will give a very brief account of what 
we consider the causes of those errors that have 
been connected with Christianity, and that have 
at times almost hidden from view the few sim- 
ple and sublime truths, which it was its pur- 
pose to reveal. To him who considers the 
state of the world at the time of the introduc- 
tion of Christianity, it will appear a thing to 
have been expected beforehand, that, when it 
should no longer be under the immediate care 
of our Saviour and his Apostles, it would very 
soon be mingled with much error and absurdity 
in the minds of those by whom it was em- 
braced. Mankind were not in a state to receive 
without corrupting it a religion so simple and 
so spiritual. With regard to God, the realities 
of another life, and the character which our 
religion requires, the mass of men had neither 
ideas nor feelings ; and even in respect to the 
social virtues it inculcates, their notions were 
very erroneous and inadequate. But every one 
conversant with such subjects may be able, in 
some degree, to comprehend how difficult it 
is to introduce into the mind an entirely new 
class of ideas and feelings, especially if they 
relate to spiritual objects; how imperfectly 
these objects are discerned till the mind has 
become habituated to their contemplation ; 



44 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

how much all ideas concerning them are de- 
based and mingled with former sentiments; 
and how readily the mind recurs to its prior 
associations, and relapses into its old habits 
of thought and feeling. It may be easily 
believed, therefore, that the Gentile converts 
did not immediately comprehend all that our 
religion teaches ; that they were not free from 
the influence of their former associations and 
habits, and that they were not at once trans- 
formed from ignorant heathens into enlight- 
ened Christians. If a thing so probable in 
itself be in need of extrinsic proof, it may be 
shown to have been the case from many pas- 
sages in the writings of the Apostles. That 
the Jewish converts connected with Christianity 
every thing in their ancient prejudices and 
opinions, which could be united with it, and 
that, if unresisted, they would have introduced 
into it some very gross corruptions, appears 
also very fully from the Scriptures themselves. 
There were likewise in this early age other 
errors of no small magnitude, whose origin we 
cannot so clearly trace. Some, for instance, 
taught, that the resurrection was already 
past,* and others wrested (we know not cer- 

* 2 Tim. ii. 18. 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 45 

tainly in support of what false doctrines) the 
epistles of St. Paul, as well as the Jewish 
Scriptures.* If such dispositions to alter and 
to add to our religion existed in the times of 
the Apostles, it is probable that they would 
operate with much more force as soon as the 
immediate personal authority of the Apostles 
was removed, and men's minds were no longer 
subdued by the visible display of miraculous 
powers/ 

But it is not wholly nor principally to the 
lower class of Christians, that we are to look 
for the origin of those errors which have been 
connected with Christianity. We are to refer 
the greater part of them to the learned and 
philosophizing converts; and corruptions from 
this source seem to have shown themselves 
nearly as soon as from the former. Some of 
the heathen philosophers deserted their schools 
for the temples of Christianity, but they did 
not leave behind them their former opinions, 
and they could not leave behind them their 
former habits of mind. With what they now 
learnt they mingled much of what they had 
before been accustomed to teach. With their 
ideas of Christianity they incorporated some- 

* 2 Peter iii. 16. 



46 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

what of their former philosophy ; they endeav- 
ored to discover resemblances between its doc- 
trines and those they had lately held, and to 
conform them as far as possible to each other. 
This, which from the very constitution of the 
mind they would naturally have done, they 
had a further inducement to do from the desire 
to recommend to others the religion they had 
themselves received, by representing it as anal- 
ogous to modes of faith already existing, and 
to systems of opinion already held in respect. 
It was doing the same thing, though probably 
vdth a less explicit acknowledgment to them- 
selves of the principle of their conduct, as 
the Roman Catholic missionaries have since 
been accustomed to do, in attempting the con- 
version of pagan nations to Christianity. A 
principal source of the errors which they intro- 
duced seems to have been a desire to elevate 
the character of our Saviour, and to make it 
such as they thought would be more respected 
by the world. The strength of the motive to 
this ill-directed ambition cannot be estimated 
by one who does not recollect how much of- 
fence it must have given to the pride of rank 
and learning, that the Founder of our religion 
suffered as a malefactor ; that its Apostles were 
in general taken from the lower class of men, 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 47 

and were continually exposed to those suffer- 
ings with which disgrace is usually associated ; 
and that it had its origin in a nation whom 
the rest of the world hated and despised. 

The Christian Fathers would less readily have 
fallen into the errors of which we have spoken, 
if they had been better skilled to understand 
the Scriptures. But, partaking before their 
conversion, and even in a considerable degree 
afterwards, of the common feelings of the 
heathen world towards the Jews, they were not 
much disposed to make what related to that 
people an object of particular study. The lan- 
guage in which the books of the Old Testa- 
ment were written, if they acquired it at all, 
which very few did, they acquired imperfectly 
after becoming Christians. They were in a 
great degree ignorant of the opinions of the 
Jews, their prejudices, their pretensions, their 
controversies, their habits and manners, and 
their modes of phraseology. But without this 
knowledge many parts of the Christian Scrip- 
tures, and especially the Epistles of St. Paul, 
cannot be correctly understood. They were 
likewise introduced at once to all the new 
ideas connected with a new religion, and to 
all the new modes of expression in which 
these were of necessity conveyed ; and these 



48 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

ideas and expressions existed in writings, which 
were in a dialect different from any thing to 
which they had been accustomed, in its forms 
of construction and in the signification of 
language, using Greek words with a Hebrew 
idiom ; so that those to whom Greek was their 
common language were perhaps nearly as 
much perplexed as assisted, in the study of the 
Scriptures, by their knowledge of it as spoken 
or written by heathen nations. 

Disqualified as the Christian Fathers thus 
were, the Scriptures could hardly have fallen 
into the hands of worse interpreters ; and 
many of their explanations of different pas- 
sages, of those adduced by them in support 
of their doctrines as well as others, have ac- 
cordingly been the wonder and ridicule of suc- 
ceeding commentators. In the Scriptures thus 
imperfectly understood they were never at a 
loss for arguments. The meaning, which was 
so obscurely seen, was made to assume any 
form that fancy might choose to impose. 
They interpreted mystically and allegorically ; 
and a passage, which in the sound of the 
words resembled a proposition in which they 
expressed some one of their doctrines, was not 
among the most contemptible arguments they 
brought to its support. They began contend- 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 49 

ing together, and in their controversies they 
mutually drove each other further from the 
truth. The doctrines of the orthodox, how- 
ever, or, in other words, of that party in these 
different controversies which finally prevailed, 
were established as the true faith, and con- 
tinued to be the doctrines of the Church till the 
time of the Reformation. The reformers, when 
they broke off from the remaining body of 
Christians, left behind them many, but by no 
means all, of these doctrines. Many of them 
still prevail, together with many of the ex- 
planations and much of the general mode of 
interpreting Scripture, with which they were 
connected. 

But why, it may be asked, — and the question 
is an important one, — why was not more resist- 
ance made, and made earlier, to errors, which 
we consider of so gross a nature, and connect- 
ed with a subject of so much interest ? We 
answer, in the first place, that the question 
does not concern us alone. Why, we may ask 
any Protestant in return, were what he will ac- 
knowledge to be gross errors suffered to pre- 
vail almost unresisted during the ten centuries 
before the Reformation ? But we shall not con- 
tent ourselves with this reply. We answer, 
that it may be, and that it has been, shown by 

5 



50 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

other writers, with regard to some of the most 
important errors which we oppose, that they 
had their origin among the learned and phi- 
losophizing Christian converts, and that they 
were not introduced without difficulty and 
without opposition from the great body of the 
unlearned, who had no prejudices in their 
favor; nor were they introduced at once, but 
gradually. But, from the period of their intro- 
duction till almost our own age, much further 
resistance could not be expected. At the time 
when Christianity began generally to be known, 
literature, and moral science, and true philoso- 
phy were all on the decline. Indeed, in the 
best days of antiquity there seems to have 
been but little of that manly reasoning in 
morals and in metaphysics, that power of treat- 
ing abstract subjects, that vigor of mind that 
repels error and absurdity, which we may dis- 
cover in later times. There is nothing of an 
intellectual nature, perhaps, in which the im- 
provement of mankind is more apparent. We 
should seek in vain in any ancient writer for 
something resembling the reasonings of Butler, 
or the metaphysics of Locke. If such, then, 
was the general character of ancient times, 
there was no reason to expect that men would 
be much shocked in receiving established er- 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 51 

rors and absurdities connected with Christiani- 
ty, similar to those which their predecessors 
had received as making a part of their philoso- 
phy, especially as this was done in an age of 
still greater ignorance and less vigor of in- 
quiry, than that in which this philosophy pre- 
vailed. There was nothing in the character of 
the times succeeding the reign of Constantino, 
previous to which some of the most important 
corruptions of Christianity had their origin, 
which would lead one to expect any powerful 
efforts of reason in opposing these or any other 
errors. Not long after his reign, the barriers 
of the Eoman empire began to give way, and 
a flood of ignorance and barbarism poured in 
upon the civilized world. Then succeeded the 
ages when the despotism of superstition was 
confirmed, and all was passive under its sway. 

This power was at last shaken. The minds 
of men, having been exercised about other ob- 
jects, and recovering some degree of strength, 
began to react against the religious tyranny 
by which they were oppressed. The time of 
the Reformation arrived. The reformers freed 
Christianity from many of the errors with 
which it had been surrounded ; but they left 
many unassailed, and they substituted errors of 
their own instead of those which they removed. 



52 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

There are those who consider the doctrines of 
the Reformation as the standard of true belief; 
but to us it seems a thing little to be expected 
beforehand, that these should be found the 
pure doctrines of Christianity. It would have 
been an event without any parallel, if the re- 
formers, educated in the belief of the prevailing 
superstitions and false doctrines of their age, 
and having them incorporated with all their 
religious principles and feelings, had been able, 
not merely to free themselves from some of 
these, but to cast them all oif together, and in 
the struggle and laceration of their minds to 
examine and to discriminate all truth from all 
error; if, educated in the age and in the re- 
ligion in which they were, they had possessed 
the most enlightened views, and been able to 
refer every thing to the most correct principles; 
if, while vehemently resisting some corruptions, 
to which their attention was particularly drawn, 
they had had leisure or disposition to turn aside 
and to consider all the other subjects connected 
with our religion, and to settle the most cor- 
rect belief upon these also ; if they had been 
willing at once to oppose themselves to later 
and to earlier errors ; if, in setting themselves 
against the Church as it existed in their day, 
they had not wished to have in their favor, or 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTL\NITY. 53 

at least to render neutral, the authority of the 
Church in earlier times, and therefore felt lit- 
tle solicitude to determine whether she might 
not even then have departed from the sim- 
plicity of the Gospel ; if they had had none of 
the very common fear of carrying their in- 
quiries too far, and departing too much from 
the faith they had once held; or if, on the 
other hand, in the violence of that fierce con- 
troversy in which they were engaged, they had 
been able coolly and impartially to estimate 
all the arguments for and against the opinions 
they defended ; if they had assumed no untena- 
ble positions ; if they had never been driven or 
had never hurried over the bounds of truth; 
if they had never mistaken the reverse of wrong 
for rights and never opposed one error to another 
(the doctrine of irresistible grace, for instance, 
to the doctrine of merit) ; if, when men had just 
begun anew to study the Scriptures, in the in- 
fancy of scriptural criticism, they had antici- 
pated all the advantages to be derived from 
this most important study, and rendered use- 
less, or worse than useless, in respect to mak- 
ing known the true character of Christianity, 
the labors of so many eminent men, who have 
in succeeding times devoted their lives to the 
elucidation of the sacred WTitings; if, in fine, 



54 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 

receiving these writings, as we believe they did, 
incrusted over with a covering of false interpre- 
tations, which hid their original meaning from 
view, they had been able at once to discern the 
true character of our religion. The reformers 
were educated in error, they were engaged in 
violent controversies, and they lived in an age 
of comparative ignorance. We do not think 
the authority of such men of any value, to es- 
tablish their doctrines as the standard of belief; 
we do not believe that the midnight darkness 
of superstition was at once succeeded by the 
noon-day splendor of truth; our philosophy 
teaches us to expect such changes as little in 
the moral as in the natural world. 

From the time of the Reformation, we think 
that, by the progress of knowledge and of 
freedom of inquiry, the real character of Chris- 
tianity has been more and more made known 
among Protestant nations ; and we think we 
discern the influence of these more correct 
views of religion in the gradual but very per- 
ceptible improvement of these nations, during 
the last three centuries, in virtue and happi- 
ness, in a more established and more general 
sense of right and wrong, in a better regulated 
state of society, and in the cultivation of the 
humane and social affections. In comparing 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 55 

the present character and condition of men in 
these nations with what it w^as in the most civ- 
ilized countries at the time of the introduction 
of Christianity, we perceive the effects of our 
religion ; and, in comparing the same present 
state of society with what it was two centuries 
ago, we perceive, as we think, the effects of a 
more improved knowledge of our religion. 
The more directly the few simple and most im- 
portant truths of Christianity can be made to 
act on the minds of men without being im- 
peded in their operation ; the more men's 
attention is directed to these without being 
distracted and occupied by the false doctrines 
with which they have been connected; the 
more they can be taught to value themselves 
upon being Christians, and not upon being 
Christians of a certain sect ; the more difficulty 
they find in mistaking the bitter feelings of a 
party for zeal in the cause of religion ; the 
more those corruptions can be removed, whose 
tendency is to substitute something else for 
personal holiness ; the more our religion can be 
freed from those additions of human weakness 
and folly, which have debased its character in 
the regard of some men, and men of powerful 
minds, by whom it might otherwise have been 
respected, and which have rendered many un- 



56 DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTLiNITY. 

believers, and many doubtful and indifferent, 
as to its truth ; — the more all this can be done, 
the more powerful and universal will be its in- 
fluence. 

But, while we rejoice in the gradual progress 
of truth, we have no intemperate zeal for mak- 
ing proselytes. Though gratified, like the rest 
of the world, that others should think with us, 
we can be content that even some of those 
whom we personally love and respect should 
think differently. There are many, especially 
among the aged, whose belief we might think 
erroneous, but whose belief we should have no 
disposition to disturb. With it are intwined 
all their religious principles and affections, 
and the former could hardly be removed with- 
out shattering or destroying the latter. It is 
the lot of a great part of the world to receive 
their religious opinions upon authority ; and, 
though there are many belonging to this class, 
whose opinions we might by no means esteem 
altogether true, yet we should not be very 
ready to lead them to doubt of the correct- 
ness of the authority in which they had con- 
fided, lest their distrust should extend to all 
they had been taught, and because we might 
not be able to substitute our own, instead of 
that authority which we had weakened or over- 



DEFENCE OF LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. 57 

turned. To such men we do not address our- 
selves, or we only address ourselves to say, that, 
if their faith has produced the fruits of good 
living, if it has shown itself in love to God and 
love to man, we have no question of its ex- 
cellence and its sufficiency to salvation; we 
should be among the last of men to wish them 
to feel pain from any doubt of its correctness. 
Let it be remembered, however, that we say 
this only to humble and unobtrusive piety, and 
not to intolerant ignorance, which pretends to 
dogmatize, and to make its own opinions the 
standard of belief On questions where wis- 
dom, and learning, and piety must have decided 
wrong, because in different men they have given 
opposite decisions, it does not become any one, 
who has not spent some time and some thought 
in their examination, to intrude his opinions, 
and far less to pronounce his censures. There 
is an obligation upon every one, which we 
hope we do not forget, to examine, with very 
serious attention, the reasonableness of that 
faith which he himself holds, and which he 
would induce others to receive. 



DISCOUESE 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OP THEOLOGY; 

DELIVERED BEFORE 

THE UNIVERSITY IN CAMBRIDGE 
(NEW ENGLAND), 

AUGUST 10, 1819, 

ON ASSUMING THE DUTIES OF DEXTER PROFESSOR 
OF SACRED LITERATURE. 



INAUGURAL DISCOURSE 



The liberality of our citizens, and especially 
of one distinguished individual,* who bore a 
name which has long been honored, and which 
I hope will long continue to be honored among 
us, having afforded new facilities for theologi- 
cal instruction in this University, an additional 
professorship has in consequence been founded. 
About to enter on the duties of this new office, 
I have thought that it would not be uninter- 
esting or useless to speak of the extent and re- 
lations of the science of theology, or, in other 
words, of the intellectual acquisitions required 
to constitute a consummate theologian. I can, 
it is true, do little more than lead you to an 
eminence, and point out hastily the great fea- 
tures of the prospect which lies before us ; but 

* Samuel Dexter, the elder. 
6 



62 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

even this rapid view may not be altogether un- 
profitable. 

In such a survey, it is in its relations to meta- 
physics, that theology may be first considered. 
It treats of God, and of man considered as an 
immortal being. Upon these subjects revela- 
tion has taught us truths the most important ; 
and some of the noblest and most powerful 
efforts of human reason have been employed in 
deducing the same truths from the moral and 
physical phenomena by which we are sur- 
rounded. It is one part of* the business of a 
theologian to make himself familiar with those 
reasonings by which the mind, now that it has 
been educated by Christianity, is able, even 
when trusting to its own powers and resources 
alone, to establish or render probable the truths 
of religion. He must become the interpreter of 
the works and providence of God, and qualify 
himself to perceive the harmony between the 
two revelations which God has given us ; — 
that, which is made known by the laws govern- 
ing the world, as they proceed in their regular 
operation ; and that, of which the divine origin 
was attested by the presence of a power con- 
trolling and suspending those laws. He will 
find a perfect harmony between them ; and will 
perceive that the evidences of both, though de- 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 63 

rived from sources very remote from each other, 
flow together at last, and bear ns on to one 
common object, — the truth of the essential 
principles of religion. 

Yet, notwithstanding the strength of argu- 
ment by which these principles are supported, 
we cannot but remark that our conclusions are 
embarrassed by some difficulties ; and we know 
that scepticism has labored to overthrow all our 
reasonings. The theologian, in pursuing his 
inquiries respecting these difficulties and objec- 
tions, if he be determined to follow them to the 
uttermost, will be obliged to go on to the very 
limits of human knowledge, — to the barriers 
beyond which our minds cannot pass. He 
must -fix a steady attention upon ideas abstract, 
shadowy, and inadequate. Where the last rays 
begin to be lost in utter darkness, he must dis- 
tinguish in the doubtful twilight between de- 
ceptive appearances and the forms of things 
really existing. He must subject to a strict 
scrutiny words and expressions which often 
deceive us, and often mock us with only a show 
of meaning. He must engage in difficult pro- 
cesses of reasoning, in which the terms of lan- 
guage, divested of their usual associations, 
become little more than algebraic symbols ; 
and, in pursuing these processes, he must pro- 



64 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

ceed with the greatest attention and accuracy, 
because a single false step may render his con- 
clusions altogether erroneous. 

The inquiries to which we are led by the ob- 
jections of the sceptic are curious, and in some 
respects important. But they are not those in 
which a man of sound mind will habitually de- 
light. He will pass from them to studies more 
satisfactory, and which have a more direct in- 
fluence upon the conduct and happiness of men, 
with feelings similar to those of the voyager, 
who, having visited the wonderful regions of 
polar solitude, where the sun dazzles but does 
not fertilize, is returning to a mild, inhabited, 
and cultivated climate. No triumph over relig- 
ion can be achieved by metaphysical scepticism 
till it has first undermined the foundations of 
all rational belief The temple in which we 
worship is placed within the citadel of human 
reason ; and, before it can be approached for 
the purpose of destruction, all knowledge not 
intuitive must have been surrendered. He who 
doubts the existence of God has left himself no 
truth, dependent on moral evidence, which he 
can reasonably believe. 

We learn the character of God by a wide in- 
duction from the laws of his moral government, 
and from the objects and phenomena of the 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 65 

physical world. Here, then, is another field of 
study opened to the theologian. We are sur- 
rounded by an unknown and immeasurable 
power, which is every moment producing mo- 
tion and life, and manifesting itself by effects 
the most astonishing and admirable. We must 
study the character of this power in its works. 
We must borrow aid from that science which 
has " wheeled in triumph through the signs of 
heaven." We must enter the lecture-room of 
the anatomist, and learn how " fearfully and 
wonderfully w^e are made." And we must fol- 
low the student of nature to the fields, and 
woods, and waters, to rocks and mines, and in- 
quire of the objects to which he directs us, 
what they can teach of their Maker. These 
studies are to be pursued, not merely as fur- 
nishing materials for argument, but because 
they awaken and render vivid our feelings of 
devotion. In contemplating the perfections of 
God without reference to his works, they pre- 
sent themselves to us as metaphysical abstrac- 
tions, which in their obscurity and vastness 
mock our comprehension. But when we turn 
to his works, we perceive his power, wisdom, 
and goodness embodied, as it were, and ren- 
dered visible. 

But our religious faith rests, for its main sup- 

6* 



66 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

port, on what we believe to be the revelation of 
God through Jesus Christ. What, then, is the 
evidence that Jesus Christ was indeed the mes- 
senger of God '? This inquiry is connected with 
the whole history of God's miraculous dispensa- 
tions, and will lead the theologian to the study 
of all the evidence relating to these subjects. 

Upon entering on this study, when he in- 
quires what it is which is to be proved, he will 
find that a mass of statements and proposi- 
tions, of very different importance, have been 
blended together; and his first object must be 
to distinguish and separate those, the truth of 
which it is indeed essential to maintain. His 
next purpose will be to make himself acquaint- 
ed with the whole evidence by which these es- 
sential truths are to be defended, to view the 
subject in all its relations, and to become aware 
of every objection and difficulty. His faith must 
not be the offspring of prejudice and ignorance, 
confident only because it has not examined, and 
ready to think an insult a good answer to an 
objection; nor a timid and doubtful belief, al- 
ways liable to be startled by some unexpected 
disclosure, the result of that state of mind in 
which one is who has proceeded in his inquiries 
only so far, as to perceive that much remains to 
be settled. The proof of the miraculous dis- 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 67 

pensations of God consists in a series of the 
most remarkable phenomena, which, if we re- 
ject the belief of such interpositions, can be ac- 
counted for by no other causes ; and which have 
marked the whole history of man with a track 
of light, like that of the rising sun on the ocean. 
In making himself acquainted with the evi- 
dences of our religion, as they have been com- 
monly stated, the theological student will per- 
ceive, that it is only a portion of its proof 
which has yet been collected and arranged ; 
and that, in the most able works which we 
have on the subject, is to be found only an 
abridgment, or a passing notice, of many impor- 
tant arguments, while others are wholly omit- 
ted. In order to feel the full force of those 
arguments to which his attention is directly 
called, he must apply the results of his own in- 
quiries to the statements which may be laid be- 
fore him. We may take, as an example, the 
evidence for our religion which arises from the 
intrinsic divinity of its character. In order to 
estimate this evidence justly, we must compare 
our religion with the systems of philosophy and 
morals by which it was preceded. It was in- 
deed an event wholly out of the sphere of nat- 
ural causes, that one who had never entered the 
schools of human wisdom, who had lived all 



68 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

his life in the midst of the gross ignorance, the 
inveterate prejudices, and the habitual and de- 
grading vices of Galilean Jews, surrounded by a 
people scarcely, if at all, more cultivated and in- 
tellectual than those who now occupy the same 
land, — that such a one should make known a 
universal religion, the most pure, the most holy, 
and the most powerful to enlighten and bless 
mankind. But in order to feel in all its force 
how marvellous a thing this was, we must know 
how much, or rather how little, had been pre- 
viously effected by the efforts of the wisest and 
most enlightened men. We must make our- 
selves acquainted with the moral and religious 
state of mankind, which preceded and was con- 
temporary with the introduction of Christianity. 
In considering the external evidences of our 
religion, regarded in connection with what 
Christianity really is, the theologian, if he be 
determined to view the subject in all its rela- 
tions, will find himself conducted into the most 
difficult parts of ecclesiastical history, where 
there are guides enough, to be sure, but few 
whom he can safely trust ; where he must com- 
pare the reports of one with those of another, 
and examine for himself, and rely upon his own 
judgment. And though the result will be, I 
trust, the full confirmation of his faith, yet the 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 69 

opinions with which he concludes may not be 
altogether the same as those with which he 
commenced his inquiries. 

When he comes to the study of the Scriptures, 
in proportion as he removes all the accumulated 
rubbish of technical theology, under which their 
meaning has been buried, and obtains a distinct 
view of it, he will discern new and very striking 
evidence of the truth of our religion. It is evi- 
dence, but a small portion of which has yet been 
distinctly presented by any writer. It arises 
from the agreement of the New Testament with 
itself, the coincidence and correspondence of its 
different parts, and its agreement with all our 
knowledge respecting the state of things which 
existed during the time of the first preaching of 
Christianity. The New Testament consists of 
different writings, comprising accounts of our 
Saviour's ministry, some account of the ministry 
of his Apostles, particularly of that of St. Paul, 
many discourses of the former, and various let- 
ters written by the latter and by other Apostles. 
The whole history which we here find is con- 
sistent with itself; and the discourses and let- 
ters are consistent with the history. They are 
so connected with the history, that, in very im- 
portant particulars, they are liable to be wholly 
misunderstood without such a careful study of 



70 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

it as may enable us to form a distinct concep- 
tion of the particular occasion of their delivery 
or composition. These discourses and writings 
reflect, as it were, the ever-varying circumstan- 
ces, which marked that most extraordinary state 
of things produced by the ministry of our Sav- 
iour and his Apostles. They have a relation 
throughout to the strong prejudices, the un- 
founded and extravagant expectations, the nar- 
row conceptions, the limited knowledge, and 
the violent and vacillating passions, of those to 
whom they were addressed. Nor is the coinci- 
dence of which I speak confined to discourses 
and writings ; it appears also in what was done 
' by our Saviour and his Apostles. It is a cor- 
respondence of their words and actions to all 
that we know, or can reasonably infer, respect- 
ing the very peculiar circumstances in which 
they acted and taught. This correspondence 
appears throughout the New Testament, rami- 
fying into numberless particulars, spreading 
everywhere, and binding all parts together. 
As we pursue our inquiries, it assumes at last a 
character so remarkable and decisive, as to put 
out of question the supposition of fiction in the 
history, or forgery in the writings. No artifice 
could approach toward giving such a perfect 
imitation of nature, with all its accidents, and 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 71 

all its minute and latent characteristics. And 
why has not this internal evidence of the truth 
of our religion been more regarded ] I answer, 
because the Scriptures have been for the most 
part so imperfectly understood ; because their 
meaning has been seen blurred and distorted 
through the medium of gross theological errors. 
The study of the Bible, and particularly of 
the New Testament, is, perhaps more than any 
other, the peculiar province of the theologian. 
In pursuing this study, he must acquaint him- 
self with that collection of facts and rules, by 
the application of which the original text of 
the sacred writings is recovered as far as pos- 
sible. He must be master of the languages in 
which they are written ; an acquaintance with 
which should be one of the first, and will con- 
tinue to be one of the last objects of his atten- 
tion. He must be, in the most comprehensive 
sense of the word, a philologist. The meaning 
of Scripture is controverted in every part, and 
he must therefore be acquainted with the art of 
interpreting language, an art, of the very exist- 
ence of which many of those, who have decided 
most confidently respecting the sense of the sa- 
cred writings, appear to have been wholly igno- 
rant. To this end he must study the nature 
and constitution of language, generally, and as 



72 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

it appears in different particular forms in which, 
it has existed. 

The interpretation of language is a subject 
which will lead him to one of the most curious 
and important branches of inquiry, one em- 
bracing the whole history of the revolutions and 
development of the human mind, and of the 
changes and accidents of human opinions and 
sentiments. In tracing this history, he must 
learn to mark with a practised eye the varying 
composition and changeable coloring of human 
ideas, which are continually forming new com- 
binations of meaning, while the old disappear, 
to be expressed by the same unaltered words 
while the same language remains in use, or by 
words apparently correspondent in the langua- 
ges which may succeed it. Words, as well as 
coins, change their value with the progress of 
society. By studying the character of lan- 
guage, the philologist and theologian will dis- 
cover its intrinsic ambiguity and imperfection. 
He will learn, what has been but little at- 
tended to, that words regarded in themselves 
alone are often inadequate to convey any one 
definite meaning ; and that the meaning, which 
the words themselves leave thus loose and un- 
settled, is to be fixed atid defined by reference 
to extrinsic considerations. He will in conse- 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 73 

quence perceive, that a mere critical knowledge 
of the languages in whicji the Scriptures are 
composed (and the same is true of other writ- 
ings) is but the first step towards their expla- 
nation. In order to know, in any particular 
instance, what is the true meaning of words, it 
is often necessary to know under what circum- 
stances and relations they were used in that 
particular instance. The theologian, therefore, 
will proceed to collect and arrange all that vari- 
ety of facts and truths, in connection with which 
the language of the Scriptures must be viewed, 
in order to perceive its bearing and relations ; 
and some one or more of which is continually 
entering as a principal element into all those 
reasonings by which its sense is determined. 
With these facts and truths he will make him- 
self familiar. Without previous knowledge of 
this sort, the words of the Scriptures, or of 
any other ancient writing, will often convey as 
false ideas and impressions to the mind, as an 
historical picture might give to one wholly ig- 
norant of the story which forms its subject. 

I have said that the expositor of Scripture 
must be a philologist in the most extensive 
sense of the word. In order to this, he must 
have the feelings and imagination of a poet. 
Without these poetry cannot be understood. 

7 



74 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

Its interpreter must have the power of sym- 
pathizing with him by whom it is composed. 
The images and emotions of the writer must 
excite corresponding images and emotions in his 
own mind. The Old Testament is full of po- 
etry ; and, in the New Testament, the Oriental 
and popular style which prevails, often requires, 
no less than poetry itself, an acquaintance with 
all the uses of language, and with all the forms 
in which feeling, passion, and imagination ex- 
press themselves, in order to distinguish and 
disengage the mere literal meaning from those 
images and ideas with which it is associated. 

Another part of the business of a theologian 
is to trace the history of our religion, and its 
effects on the condition of society. In other 
words, he must be familiar with ecclesiastical 
history. In this study, one of the most inter- 
esting objects of attention will be the origin 
and progress of those errors, which have cast 
their shade over the Christian world, and inter- 
cepted the influence of the gospel. He will 
discover, that many of these errors belong to an 
earlier age than Christianity itself; and that 
their sources are to be found in the supersti- 
tions, and still more in the philosophy, which 
existed before our religion was preached to 
men. The converts to our faith did not yield 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 75 

up their minds to its reception with an entire 
renunciation of every former belief and prepos- 
session. They did not divest themselves of all 
former trains of thought and reasoning, and 
all former imaginations and sentiments. The 
light which spread over the world was mingled 
with the darkness which had before prevailed ; 
and God' did not, as in the beginning, divide the 
light from the darkness. Men received much 
that was true, but they also retained much 
that was false; and truth and falsehood grew 
up together, and constituted the religion which 
was professed. The past and present errors of 
Christians are many of them to be traced to a 
heathen origin, and especially to the heathen 
philosophy. 

The theologian, therefore, who, in studying 
the evidences of our religion, had before been 
led to consider the previous condition, opin- 
ions, and character of mankind, will find him- 
self conducted anew to the same subject by 
a different route, and brought to view it under 
a different aspect. The study of ancient phi- 
losophy lies before him. He must make him- 
self familiar with forms of error, and modes of 
exhibiting truth, very different from those to 
which he has been accustomed. He must be- 
come, as it were, an inquisitive traveller in a 



76 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

strange country, among men who use a new 
language ; and he will see around him much, 
of which he cannot at once comprehend the 
reason, the origin, or the relations. The phi- 
losophy of every age has had a powerful influ- 
ence upon the contemporary forms of religion 
professed among Christians. But it is of essen- 
tial importance to be acquainted with that phi- 
losophy which prevailed when Christianity was 
first taught; because this, as I have said, was 
the parent of many of those errors which still 
exist, and which now, made hoary by time, are 
regarded with a veneration to which they are 
wholly without title. 

In the study of ecclesiastical history, in order 
to estimate justly the facts and characters which 
it brings before us, a thorough knowledge of 
human nature is required. And this study, in 
its turn, may teach us more of the human char- 
acter than perhaps any other. It will show us 
the best and the worst passions operated upon 
by the strongest motives. It will teach us to 
think at once more highly and more humbly of 
man, and discover to us all his strength, all his 
weakness, and all his inconsistency. It will 
show us the strange forms in which his virtues 
may appear, and the infamous disguises which 
his vices may assume. It will show us the 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 77 

most remarkable and apparently the most hete- 
rogeneous combinations of moral and intellect- 
ual qualities. It will present to us, in every 
variety, those complex characters vy^hich it is so 
difficult to estimate ; because they exhibit the 
worldly and selfish passions in alliance with 
religion, and it is hard to determine to what 
point the latter is debased, or how far the for- 
mer may be modified by the connection ; to 
what degree self-deception may exist, and how 
far it is to be admitted as an excuse ; or how 
far the errors and vices of the age may be 
pleaded in apology for those of the individual. 
It will teach us, that even powerful minds may 
be paralyzed by the touch of superstition ; that 
there is no depth of debasement to which the 
human understanding may not be reduced ; and 
that there is nothing so unmeaning, so false, so 
shocking, or so self-contradictory, that it may 
not be received for divine truth. 

But one of the most grateful studies of the 
theologian is to trace the real influence of the 
true principles of Christianity. He will rejoice 
to observe how much they have done to raise 
the character of man, and to improve the con- 
dition of society. Going back into past ages, 
and becoming, as it were, a citizen of Athens 
or of Eome, making himself familiar with all 

7* 



78 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

that can be known of their manners, morals, 
religion, and political institutions, entering 
their schools to listen to the teaching of their 
philosophers, and mingling on their festival 
days with the crowd celebrating their rites of 
worship, he will perceive how much the imagi- 
nation has disguised their moral depravity, their 
ignorance, and their miseries ; and will return 
to offer up thanks to God, that he was born 
among Christians. 

The proper office of religious belief is the for- 
mation of character. Our faith teaches us, that 
we shall be happy or miserable in a future life, 
as we have done good, or done evil, in the pres- 
ent. But what is good ] What is virtue 1 
These are inquiries which the theologian has 
to answer. It may be said, that, as far as re- 
gards practice, they are easily settled. When 
the question is merely, whether some particular 
action be lawful or not, it is easily settled, in a 
majority of cases of common occurrence, by one 
who will not let the inferior part of his nature 
triumph over his judgment. But different na- 
tions, different sects of Christians, and different 
individuals have held opposite opinions upon 
many subjects of morals of the greatest practi- 
cal importance. You think religious persecu- 
tion a profanation of the name of Christianity, 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 79 

and an outrage upon the first principles of nat- 
ural justice. But a little more than a century 
ago, it was regarded as one of the first duties of 
a Christian community, and there were very few 
Christian communities which did not act in con- 
formity to this error. Most Christians now 
have, or profess to have, a decided opinion and 
strong feeling against it ; but, if any one be in 
the habit of ascribing a high value to the au- 
thority of the Church, it may startle him to 
recollect, that he has the authority of Christen- 
dom against him from the fifth century to the 
end of the seventeenth. 

There have been other gross and disastrous 
mistakes concerning morals in the Christian 
world. Very erroneous, and consequently very 
mischievous, opinions have prevailed concern- 
ing the fundamental questions, "What consti- 
tutes the Christian character 1 and How must 
it be formed 1 These mistakes imply a radical 
misconception of what constitutes moral excel- 
lence ; for it is in the attainment of moral ex- 
cellence that the Christian character consists. 
Thev have shown themselves in all those ima^i- 
nary substitutes for personal goodness, the efii- 
cacy of which has been so eagerly believed. 
The superstitions of Heathenism in India have 
hardly produced devotees more wanting in the 



80 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

qualities that entitle men to respect or love, or 
with more characteristics that excite disgust or 
pity, than some of those who have been ven- 
erated as models of Christian excellence in dif- 
ferent ages and among different sects of the 
Christian world. 

Christianity has been represented as lending 
the authority of its sanctions to errors the most 
alien from it, by requiring men to submit their 
consciences and their reason to ecclesiastical 
rule, to the decisions of a church. It has been 
represented as in alliance with arbitrary power, 
and as enjoining as a duty passive obedience to 
all rulers, especially hereditary rulers, whatever 
may be their character and acts. The latter 
doctrine was insisted upon but a century ago 
by men of more than common ability. The 
former doctrine survives in its original vigor. 
There are at the present day other questions 
agitated, of great practical importance. Some 
Christians, entitled to much respect for their 
virtues, deny the right of defensive war. There 
are, to give a very different example. Christians 
who allow a license that appears to others in a 
high degree criminal, maintaining the lawful- 
ness of professing to believe articles of faith 
which they do not believe. It may seem 
strange to mention this as an unsettled point 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 81 

of morality; but there is no doubt that the 
matter is still controverted in the minds of 
many individuals, who commonly arrive at 
what we should consider a wrong decision. 

But the questions as to what we ought not 
to do are of much easier solution than those 
which relate to what we ought to do. The na- 
ture and extent of the duties of active benevo- 
lence, of those duties which require something 
to be done, in contradistinction from those 
which require something to be avoided, are 
very imperfectly understood. Different men 
have different notions of right and wrong, and 
estimate very differently the requisitions of 
duty ; and they pursue in consequence very dif- 
ferent modes of life. Perhaps the selfishness 
that appears in not acting leaves as much 
misery to exist in the world as aggressive self- 
ishness creates. 

As to the principles of morals, there is no 
greater agreement than with regard to the prac- 
tice. There are moralists, who contend that 
some one particular motive, which they select 
from all others, is in every case necessary to 
constitute an action virtuous. There are oth- 
ers, who allow that there are many motives 
which all partake of the nature of virtue. 
Those, too, who admit but one differ most 



82 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

widely from each other as to the character of 
this one ; some, for instance, resolving all vir- 
tue into refined selfishness, and others into per- 
fect benevolence ; — some contending that all 
things are to be done for the glory of God, in 
some literal sense of those terms, not in the 
popular sense in v^^hich they are used by the 
Apostle ; and others, that we are to be guided 
solely by that intuitive perception of right and 
wrong which they ascribe to conscience, consid- 
ered as a distinct faculty of the mind. With 
different opinions respecting morals, men may 
practise in a considerable degree alike ; but it 
would be idle to contend, that their opinions 
have no influence on their practice, and none 
on their character and happiness. From the 
inseparable connection between theology and 
morals, it is the business of the theologian to 
study the principles of the latter science, and to 
trace out their proper bearing on the conduct 
of men. Morality is not to be determined by 
our first impressions ; nor is it a matter of in- 
tuitive judgment. We cannot be sure that all 
which we have been taught concerning it is 
true. It is not, as has been said, a science 
which admits of no discoveries. Morality is 
now better understood than in former times, 
and it will, we may believe, be better under- 
stood by our posterity than it is by us. 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 83 

The ultimate objects of a theologian should 
be to improve his own character, and the moral 
condition of his fellow-men. But, in order to 
effect the latter purpose, it is necessary to un- 
derstand the human character. The compli- 
cated machinery of the mind is easily deranged ; 
and no small mischief has been often produced 
by the ill-directed attempts of the ignorant and 
violent to regulate and put it in motion. You 
have undertaken to be a guide to the erring, 
and an instructor of the ignorant. You have 
undertaken to lead men in the path of virtue 
and holiness. Take care that you do not repel 
them from it, or lead them astray. It is not so 
simple a work as one may imagine. A sen- 
tence may undo the effect of a sermon. It is 
the ojffice of a theologian to administer the med- 
icine of the mind ; and, in order to do this, he 
should be acquainted with its general constitu- 
tion, and the diseases to which it is liable. 

And how is this necessary knowledge of hu- 
man nature to be acquired 1 In the first place, 
by distinctly perceiving the truth, that it is a 
kind of knowledge which may and ought to be 
acquired, — that it does not come merely by 
chance or by intuition. Every one judges of 
the characters of those around him ; but how 
few judge correctly. In no science is it so ne- 



84 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

cessary, as in the science of human nature, for 
the learner to be first convinced of his igno- 
rance. In order to remove this ignorance, we 
must study our own hearts. We must be in 
the habit of analyzing those aggregates of mo- 
tives from which we usually act, and of giving 
to every individual motive its true name. We 
must observe how we ourselves are affected by 
the actions and words of others, how often the 
effect produced is different from that intended, 
and we must remark why it is so. We must 
study human life as it lies around us, present- 
ing phenomena not less various, nor less diffi- 
cult of explanation, than those of the material 
world. We must remark the influence of those 
circumstances, that operate so powerfully to 
mould the character in its formation, and to 
produce those subsequent changes which often 
render it, in advanced life, not less different 
from what it was in youth, than the counte- 
nance itself; so that, like that, it retains only 
something of the outline of its former features. 
We must acquaint ourselves with the principle 
of association, that great law of the mind, 
which it is so important to regulate; which, 
when not properly regulated, operates with blind 
agency, binding together thoughts and senti- 
ments and feelings in mischievous connection. 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 85 

We must observe how often this law is directed 
to the production of evil, by the want of consid- 
eration, or judgment, or temper, in those who 
undertake the business of moral instruction. 
We must study the volume of human history 
with its numberless pages, and learn the nature 
of man from his past actions and works. We 
must be acquainted with those productions in 
which the human character is justly exhibited 
by the great masters of the art, and in which 
poetry and eloquence give a vivid expression of 
human feelings and sentiments. We must 
study the writings, in which a mild philosophy 
has shed a steady illumination upon the mind 
and heart of man ; and those also, in which, as 
in the histories of Tacitus, flashes are, every 
now and then, breaking forth, which send light 
into the recesses where the viler passions hide 
themselves. The knowledge of human nature 
is a science ; and if in this, as in other branches 
of knowledge, some have a natural aptitude for 
its acquisition more than others, yet our ac- 
quirements will depend much upon our exer- 
tions. It is a science, too, which has shared 
with every other in the progress of improve- 
ment. Our acquaintance with the principles 
and motives which influence the mind and 
heart of man is more extensive and correct 
8 



86 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

than the knowledge of those who have pre- 
ceded us. 

It remains to consider what preparatory stud- 
ies are required for the attainment of theologi- 
'dal -knowledge. A theologian must be familiar 
with the ancient languages. But this is not all. 
>Ais respects the modern languages, we must 
not confine ourselves to the sources of informa- 
tion which may be found in our own. There 
are many works of much value to a theologian 
in the French and German. In Germany, for 
the last forty or fifty years, the science of the- 
ology has been more cultivated than in any 
other country ; though certainly not altogether 
with the happiest results. Nobody, I trust, 
will imagine, that I admire the licentious, and, 
-as it seems to me, most extravagant and un- 
tenable speculations of some of the modern 
German theologians. In reading their works, 
I find what I cannot but regard as theories and 
arguments of impalpable inanity; I seem, like 
JEneas when entering the confines of the dead, 
-to -be passing through a region of monstrous 
i^ghadows, and to be, like him, pursuing a jour- 
ney, 

" Quale per incertam lunam, sub luce maligna. 
Est iter in sylvis." 

Some of these theologians, who have attained 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 87 

a certain degree of celebrity out of their own 
country, are, I think, not entitled to any kind 
of respect. To others of them one may be dis- 
posed to apply the character which Thirlby, in 
the celebrated dedication of his edition of Justin 
Martyr, gives of Isaac Vossius : — " He had 
great learning, superior genius, and judgment 
too, which, if not very great, was enough and 
more than enough for one, who, unless I am 
entirely deceived, cared but little about discov- 
ering the truth upon any subject. He made it 
his object to seek for and invent new, out-of-the- 
way, and wonderful opinions in criticism, in 
philosophy, and in theology. Whether they 
were true or not, he left to be examined by 
those who might think themselves interested in 
the matter." * But this character is far from 
being applicable to the whole body of modern 
German theologians. There are many who are 
not entitled to the praise, and some who are 
not obnoxious to the censure. Some have exe- 



* " Erant in eo homine multae litersB, ingenium excellens, judi- 
cium etiam, si non maximum, at tantum quantum ei satis superque 
fuit, qui, nisi omnia me fallunt, quid in quavis re verum esset, le- 
viter curavit perspicere. Satis habuit nova, devia, mirabilia, in 
critica, in philosophia, in theologia, quserere et excogitare : vera 
anne falsa essent, id vero aliis exquirendum reliquit, qui sua istuc 
interesse existimarent . ' ' 



88 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

cuted laborious works of great value ; and oth- 
ers have written with sobriety and good sense, 
as well as learning and ingenuity. As re- 
spects the mass of those works with which we 
can become acquainted only through the Ger- 
man language, their value, without doubt, has 
been considerably overrated; nor would it be 
safe to recommend the indiscriminate study of 
them to one apt to estimate the truth of opin- 
ions by their novelty. But still the value of 
many of these works is such, as to render a 
knowledge of the language very desirable to 
the theological student, and necessary to a con- 
summate theologian. 

In enumerating the intellectual qualifications 
necessary, I have perhaps convinced you, that 
it is impossible to be a theologian. In the 
highest and most comprehensive sense of the 
word it may be so. But perhaps I shall have 
done some service, if I have convinced you, that 
it is no easy thing to acquire those qualiii ca- 
tions, which a theologian, in the more popular 
sense of the word, may be fairly expected to 
possess. More, a great deal more, is necessary 
than a familiar acquaintance with some system 
of technical divinity, and with the arguments 
by which this is usually defended. Much more 
is required than that knowledge which a man 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 89 

may collect from reading a few books in our 
own language, and those perhaps the books of 
a particular sect. Much more than a familiar- 
ity with those metaphysical quibbles, which 
show how much morbid ingenuity may remain, 
while common sense is entirely prostrated; and 
which, at the same time, like words of magic, 
darken the whole creation of God to those by 
whom they are pronounced. Much more than 
to be able to quote a mass of texts indiscrimi- 
nately from different books of the Bible, and to 
interpret them conformably to the use of words 
in that theological dialect which we may have 
learnt in childhood. And much more is re- 
quired than a facility in running through all 
those errors which our church, or our party, 
may have faithfully preserved, since the time 
when the science, of which I speak, lay in a 
state of the lowest debasement. True theology 
has little to do with any of these acquirements. 
It is a science of vast extent and dignity, em- 
bracing all the knowledge which directly or 
remotely concerns man as an immortal being. 
We believe, indeed, that its most important 
truths, and the main arguments by which these 
are defended, may be made intelligible to all ; 
that in its last results it coincides with the first 
judgments of unprejudiced reason ; and that the 



90 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

man of plain good-sense, who exercises his un- 
derstanding and thinks for himself, and the 
profound and intelligent scholar, will find that 
there are no essential points of difference in 
their fundamental opinions. We may all ar- 
rive at last upon common ground, where the 
highest and humblest may meet together. 

But if any one refuse to submit to the decis- 
ions of our natural reason, and the dictates of 
our natural feelings ; if he come to us, teaching 
what he calls incomprehensible propositions, 
and truths above reason ; if he maintain doc- 
trines abhorrent to all our best sentiments re- 
specting God and his moral government ; and 
if he require us to believe the system which he 
has received; we have a right to ask in re- 
turn, What are his qualifications to discuss 
these subjects 1 How extensively has he exam- 
ined, how profoundly has he thought upon their 
nature and relations '? How thoroughly has he 
acquired all that preparatory knowledge which 
is necessary in their investigation'? What is 
the compass of his studies, and what the reach 
of his faculties, that he thinks his judgments of 
so much value, and his censures of so much 
authority ] Has he in fact gone through that 
long course of discipline, necessary to enable 
him to decide questions of science and criticism, 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 91 

as they arise in the study of theology'? We 
shall find, in many cases, that our new teacher 
is just as well qualified for the work which he 
has undertaken, as one with, or without, a little 
elementary knowledge of mathematics would 
be qualified to decide on the truth of the dem- 
onstrations of Newton or La Place. Is theol- 
ogy, the most profound and comprehensive of 
sciences, the only one in which ignorant pre- 
sumption may be allowed to dogmatize] It 
has done this, and it has done much more. It 
has oppressed and persecuted. Hence it is, that 
the progress of truth has been so slow and em- 
barrassed. The operation of vulgar prejudices 
and passions has restrained the intellect of the 
wisest, and checked the courage of the boldest; 
and the science has in consequence not yet at- 
tained that rank and estimation which belong 
to it. It has been degraded by the irruptions 
of ignorance and barbarism ; its provinces have 
been seized upon, and the rightful possessors of 
the soil driven away. 

Something, then, has been efiected, if any just 
views have been given you of the importance 
and dignity of this science. It is, in truth, the 
highest philosophy, including every thing most 
interesting in speculation and practice. In pro- 
portion as it is better understood and taught, 



92 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

the minds of men will be more enlightened, and 
their moral principles and feelings elevated and 
improved. And there is hope that it will be 
better understood and taught. The obstacles 
which have opposed its progress are continually- 
giving way. The human understanding will 
not much longer submit to such reasoning on 
the subjects of theology, as on every other sub- 
ject it has learned to treat with contempt. The 
prejudice, before which the world bowed but yes- 
terday, will to-morrow find " none so poor to do 
it reverence." Let us consider how much the 
cause of true reHgion, and virtue, and happiness, 
for they are all inseparably connected, has been 
advanced during the last two centuries. Let us 
consider how much may be gained in the ages 
to come, if we are but faithful to our posterity, 
and they are but faithful to themselves. It is 
only two centuries since Grotius lived ; since 
the time when he was struggling against igno- 
rance, and persecution, and " oppositions of 
science falsely so called," to guide his contem- 
poraries in the way to truth. His contempora- 
ries, in return, attempted to confine and extin- 
guish, within the walls of a prison, that light 
which was to spread itself through the world. 
They drove him from his native land; and, 
when the shades of death were about to close 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 93 

upon him, he might have looked round and 
seen not a single country free from the oppres- 
sion of ecclesiastical tyranny ; and only one in 
which any religion unmixed with the grossest 
error enjoyed even a doubtful toleration ; only 
one where a few harassed individuals had found 
a temporary refuge, from which they were just 
about to be driven.* What deep and holy joy 
would have filled the mind of that great man, if 
a prophetic vision could have been accorded to 
him of what we now behold around us ; if, amid 
his labors, disappointments, and sufferings, he 
could have been assured that he had not la- 
bored and sufiered in vain ; if he could have 
foreseen that in this country, — which was then 
just appearing within the political horizon, but 
which even then had attracted his attention, 
and been one object of his extensive studies, — 
a vast empire was to be established, throughout 
which the principles of religious liberty should 
be fully recognized, and in which so large a 
portion of the community should comprehend 
the essential character, and feel the true influ- 
ence, of our religion. But there is a promise of 
fairer and happier days to the whole civilized 
world. The light of Christianity has been ob- 

* I refer to the expulsion of the Unitarians from Poland in 1661. 



94 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

scured, and men have been travelling in dark- 
ness. But the thick vapors which concealed 
earth and heaven are breaking away ; and we 
begin to perceive the beautiful prospect which 
lies before us, and the glittering of spires and 
pinnacles in the distance. 

In enumerating the intellectual acquisitions 
necessary to constitute a consummate theolo- 
gian, one may naturally feel some apprehension 
like that which Cicero expresses, when about 
to speak of those requisite in an orator : " Ve- 
reor ne tardem studia multorum, qui despera- 
tione debilitati, experiri nolint, quod se assequi 
posse diffidant." I may, however, say as he 
does : " Sed par est omnes omnia experiri, qui 
res magnas, et magno opere expetendas, concu- 
piverunt. Quod si quem aut natura sua, aut 
ilia praestantis ingenii vis, forte deficiet, aut mi- 
nus instructus erit magnarum artium discipli- 
nis ; teneat tamen eum cursum, quem poterit. 
Prima enim sequentem, honestum est in secun- 
dis tertiisque consistere." All the knowledge 
which the theological student acquires will be 
valuable. Whatever faculties he cultivates may 
be turned to account. It would be a poor rea- 
son to neglect to do any thing, because there is 
so much which may be done to advantage. 

It is to our clergy that we must look for a 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 95 

body of learned theologians. It is through 
them principally, that the benefits of this sci- 
ence are to be derived to the community. But, 
in order that they may become qualified for 
their ofiice, the means of education must be af- 
forded them ; and leisure must be aff'orded them 
to pursue their studies, when the work of edu- 
cation is finished. The standard of preaching 
is very high with us ; and it certainly is not 
desirable that it should be lowered. But, this 
being the case, the mere weekly round of a 
clergyman's labors has been found in some sit- 
uations too severe, and even destructive of 
health and life. We have witnessed the spec- 
tacle of men of the finest genius perishing un- 
der the slow torture of unremitted mental exer- 
tion. Something has been done to prevent the 
recurrence of this calamity ; and means might 
be easily devised, — but this is not the place to 
point them out, — to lessen the pressure of du- 
ties which is still too great. It is with theol- 
ogy, as with every other department of knowl- 
edge and literature; if we would have them 
flourish among us, we must show that we esti- 
mate their value, and the worth of those ser- 
vices which are devoted to their cultivation. 
We must not be " slowly wise," nor "meanly 
just." In conferring public rewards, there is 



96 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

nothing more opposite to true wisdom, than a 
calculating spirit of parsimony. Our literary 
men have been pursuing their labors under pe- 
culiar disadvantages ; and we must be ready to 
afford every facility and every encouragement to 
their exertions ; to extend a steady patronage to 
our literary institutions, to increase our public 
libraries, and to enlarge all our means of knowl- 
edge. We must be generous, and considerate, 
and kind ; ready to praise and approve where 
praise and approbation are merited ; liberal in 
our rewards, and reasonable in our demands. 

If we would not have our country, with all 
its immeasurable resources, become a sort of 
barbaric empire ; if we would not have a half- 
civilized population spread over our soil, igno- 
rant of all that adorns, and ennobles, and pu- 
rifies the character of man ; if we would not be 
overrun with every form of fanaticism and 
folly; if we desire that our intellectual and 
moral rank should keep pace with our unceas- 
ing enlargement as a nation ; if we desire that 
just notions of religion, and correct principles 
of duty, should manifest their influence, and 
convey their blessings through the community ; 
if we love our native land, and rejoice in its 
honor, and should be humbled in its degrada- 
tion ; we must recollect that good and evil are 



EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 97 

before us, and that it is for us to choose which 
we will ; but that the one is not to be secured, 
nor the other avoided, by accident. What we 
may become will depend upon ourselves ; not 
upon what we may wish, but upon what we 
may do. The character of its intellectual men 
gives its character to a nation. That literature 
which is without morals and without Christian 
faith, like the literature of France during the 
age of Voltaire, is one of the worst evils to 
which God ever abandons a people. That lit- 
erature which throughout regards men as his 
creatures, and as immortal beings, is one of 
the greatest blessings which he ever confers. 
As for those who are engaged in the studies of 
which I have been speaking, they have motives 
enough, in whatever situation they may be, to 
call forth all their efforts. But in our country, 
w^here so much is at stake ; where the last ex- 
periment seems to be making, to determine 
what man may become when placed in the 
most favorable circumstances ; w^here everv 
thing is in a forming state, and so much de- 
pends upon the impressions now received, and 
the direction now given, the motives of which 
I speak acquire an overwhelming force. What 
must be the responsibility of those who are en- 
gaged in studies, which have so direct an infiu- 



98 EXTENT AND RELATIONS OF THEOLOGY. 

ence upon the character and condition of men ! 
And what consciousness of desert can be more 
honorable or more animating than his, who 
feels that he is directing all his efforts, that he 
is devoting the whole energy 'of his mind, that 
he is pouring himself out like water to swell 
the tide which is to bear his country on to hap- 
piness and glory ! 



THOUGHTS 



ON 



TRUE AND PALSE RELIGION, 



The following tract was first published in the " Christian 
Disciple " for September and October, 1820. 



THOUGHTS 



ON 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION 



Considered merely in relation to this world, 
there is no subject on which it is more impor- 
tant for us to hold correct opinions, than on the 
subject of religion. There are no questions of 
such interest to us, as those which it proposes 
to answer. There is no department of knowl- 
edge, in which ignorance and error so essen- 
tially afiect the character and condition of indi- 
viduals and of society. Determine the relative 
degrees of virtue and happiness in different 
communities, and you will have determined the 
relative degrees in which the influence of cor- 
rect religious principle is felt; and, on the 
other hand, false notions of religion, ignorance, 
and superstition will be found in nearly the 
same proportions as vice and misery. 

There is abundant proof of the fact just stat- 
ed. We find evidence of it in the condition of 

9* 



102 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

the most polished heathen nations, the Greeks 
and Romans. There is indeed a deceptive glare 
cast around them by the splendors of art and 
genius. We are liable to be deluded, likewise, 
by a vulgar, school-boy admiration of virtues, 
v^hich never existed but in fancy; and of which 
scarce any other show of evidence is to be 
found, but some high-sounding epithets, used 
by such writers as Livy in compliment to their 
countrymen, and interpreted at the present day 
in conformity to our own notions of moral ex- 
cellence, and not those of a heathen. But, put- 
ting aside these causes of error, if we examine 
into the real condition of those ancient nations, 
we shall find melancholy and decisive evidence 
of the truth maintained. It will gather round 
us from every side. Their religion, erroneous 
and corrupting as it was, will be found a true 
index of the virtue and happiness 'which exist- 
ed ; and the want of some higher principle of 
moral conduct, than it was capable of furnish- 
ing, will appear in the examples of profligacy, 
injustice, and cruelty, which will rise in dark 
masses to our view ; in the general want -of per- 
sonal security and peace ; in the absence of do- 
mestic comfort and those charities which make 
life dear to us ; and in the loosely compacted 
machinery and irregular movements of every 
organized society. 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 103 

We may look to the dark ages ; and compare 
the state of religion, though that religion was 
called Christianity, with the state of morals, 
safety, and happiness. We may look for fur- 
ther evidence of the truth maintained to Spain 
and Italy, or to Turkey and Hindostan. We 
may consider the tremendous lesson which 
France has been giving to mankind. We may 
look where we will, and we shall everywhere 
perceive the same general correspondence be- 
tween the notions, true or false, which prevail 
concerning religion, and the condition, good or 
bad, of those by whom they are held. 

But we need not recur to the observation of 
what has been, in order to prove that the direct 
influence of religion, properly understood, is in 
the highest degree beneficial. We have only 
to consider what must be the operation of the 
truths which it makes known. For the happi- 
ness and consolation of man, it teaches him that 
he is the creature and care of infinite goodness. 
To support and animate him in all virtue, it is 
continually inculcating the truth, that God has 
made him the arbiter of his own happiness or 
misery ; and that virtue and happiness are the 
same. It makes him know and feel, that the 
more good he communicates, the more he en- 
joys ; and that benevolence, generosity, and 



104 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

self-devotion are his interest. It places dis- 
tinctly before him the fact, that there are pleas- 
ures of two kinds ; some, which of themselves, 
by their mere excess and repetition, exhaust 
the power of enjoyment, and make the soul 
" embody and embrute," leaving it at last with- 
out any sensibility but to pain ; and others, 
which invigorate the faculties, which enlarge 
our capacities for happiness, whose enjoyment 
is but a step to higher enjoyment ; and this to 
continue for ever. The influence of such relig- 
ion on the intellectual is not less than upon the 
moral part of man. By preserving the mind 
pure from vice, it preserves its faculties in free 
and healthy exercise. The truths which it 
teaches have a bearing on almost every other 
interesting speculation. The moral taste which 
it cultivates is intimately connected with the 
taste for every other sort of beauty; and the 
enlargement and elevation produced by the ha- 
bitual contemplation of the infinite, the invis- 
ible, and the remote, will manifest themselves 
in all the operations and purposes of the mind. 
Nor are we to estimate the power of religion 
in a community merely by its direct influence. 
It affects those who think least of its value. It 
affects them through public sentiment, by rais- 
ing the standard of morals, by rendering a cer- 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 105 

tain decorum of manners necessary to any de- 
gree of estimation, by the direct action of sym- 
pathy with those around them, and by the con- 
tinual operation of institutions, and modes of 
thinking and acting, in which the truths of re- 
ligion are recognized. 

But we must not expect a beneficial influ- 
ence from every thing which is called religion. 
We must attend to something more than the 
name ; for poison as well as food has been 
called by this name. Religion, considered in 
the abstract, is a system of truths, and operates 
on the mind through faith in these truths. 
But because these truths are of a nature to 
yield the most blessed fruits, it does not follow, 
that a system of opinions inconsistent with, or 
contradictory to them, will produce the same 
effects, because men have given the same name 
to both. If religion be of the highest value, 
because it afi'ords us as clear notions of the Di- 
vinity as we are capable of receiving, it does 
not follow that a system is of any value, which 
confounds our notions of God by unintelligible 
doctrines respecting his nature. If religion be 
adapted to produce the most excellent virtues, 
by holding forth the most powerful motives and 
sanctions, and requiring that these should be 
regarded in every moral action, we cannot 



106 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

therefore infer, that the same effect is to be ex- 
pected from a religion which traffics in par- 
dons for sin ; or from a religion which teaches 
men that the main thing is to perform certain 
rites and to regard certain observances ; or 
from a religion which insists on the reception 
of a system of doctrines as the sure and only 
passport to eternal happiness; and still less 
from one which brings virtue into contrast 
with some other requisition or characteristic, 
and makes light of the former, and regards it 
even as a subject of contempt and jealousy, in 
comparison with the latter, — denominating 
all human excellence by some such title as 
the filthy rags of self-righteousness. If it be 
the genuine operation of true religion to pro- 
duce a constant effort after moral perfection, 
because it teaches that good and evil are be- 
fore us, and that it is for us to choose and 
attain which we will ; we cannot conclude 
that this will be the operation of a religion, 
which inculcates, as a fundamental truth, the 
doctrine, that we have no moral power, that 
our condition will not at all depend on any 
thing which we may do ; but that our eternal 
happiness or misery has been determined by the 
pleasure of another being, who has issued his 
irreversible decrees without reference to any 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 107 

qualities which he may see in us. True re- 
ligion is an inestimable blessing; because it 
teaches that God is the everlasting Friend and 
Father of his creatures, a God of infinite good- 
ness. But what shall we say of a religion 
which teaches that he has formed men so, that 
they are by nature wholly inclined to all moral 
evil ; that he has determined in consequence to 
inflict upon the greater part of our race the 
most terrible punishments ; and that, unless he 
has seen fit to place us among the small num- 
ber of those whom he has chosen out of the 
common ruin, he will be our eternal enemy 
and infinite tormentor ; that, having hated us 
from our birth, he will continue to exercise 
upon us for ever his unrelenting and omnipo- 
tent hatred! Whatever may be the worth of 
true religion, it surely does not follow, that this 
system of blasphemy must be also of great val- 
ue, and very beneficial in its efiects. Yet he 
must be a very ignorant, or a very bold man, 
who will aflirm, that the doctrines last stated 
have not been taught, and very extensively too, 
as fundamental doctrines of Christianity. 

With us Christians, religion is identified with 
Christianity. We receive the truths which it 
teaches, not because we are able to establish 
them by the deductions of our reason, but be- 



108 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

cause we believe them to have been taught by 
God ; because we think that the uncertain de- 
ductions of reason have been confirmed by the 
highest possible authority. But what is Chris- 
tianity ] A very different thing, unquestion- 
ably, from what has been the professed religion 
of far the greater part of Christians. The prop- 
osition may appear startling at first sight ; but 
consider the state of Christendom from the 
fourth century to the sixteenth, and ask your- 
self, how great was the resemblance between 
the system of doctrines which prevailed during 
this period, and the system of truths which was 
taught by Jesus Christ ] AVhen you are satis- 
fied with regard to the faith of the Catholic 
Church, you may then examine the scheme of 
doctrines developed in the Institutes of Cal- 
vin ; or the same scheme, as it appears di- 
gested in the works of the Westminster Assem- 
bly. If any one, wholly unacquainted with our 
religion, were told, that this w^as Christianity ; 
and that the system taught in these books was 
to be found in another collection of books, 
called the New Testament, I believe his sur- 
prise would be uncontrollable and unimagin- 
able, when he came to read the New Testament 
itself, and to understand what is actually taught 
there. 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 109 

If what we regard as Christianity, then, be 
true and valuable, what are we to think of such 
systems as those just mentioned 1 Why do we 
value Christianity '? Because it gives us assur- 
ance of certain truths, which we believe to be 
of infinite importance. These truths constitute 
our religion. The character which we attach to 
them is not to be transferred to any thing dif- 
ferent, and still less to any thing contradictory. 
So far as religion is concerned, these truths, and 
these alone, have operated to improve the con- 
dition of men. Whatever is opposed to them, 
whether it be taught under the name of Chris- 
tianity or not, is opposed to Christianity. Just 
in proportion as we regard the latter as valu- 
able, shall we regard the former as pernicious. 
Just in proportion as we are desirous of pro- 
moting the influence of true religion, shall we 
be desirous of removing all those false doc- 
trines by which its influence is counteracted 
and destroyed ; and counteracted and destroyed 
the more efl'ectually, because they have assumed 
its name and authority. 

There cannot be different systems of equal 
value. There are not two opposite kinds of 
truth in religion. Nothing can be more irra- 
tional than a strong attachment to any partic- 
ular mode of faith, or form of worship, accom- 

10 



110 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

panied with indifference about its correctness, 
ahd indisposition to inquire into its real char- 
acter. Nothing can be more loose or incon- 
sistent than his opinions, who thinks religion a 
great good, but does not think it worth the while 
to ascertain what particular doctrines religion 
teaches. If certain truths are of infinite im- 
portance, the errors opposed to them are in the 
highest degree pernicious ; and he who main- 
tains the latter, as if they were of the same 
nature with the former, is committing a very 
serious mistake indeed. 

It is true, that the worst errors respecting 
Christianity do not always produce their natu- 
ral effects. Perhaps they never have produced 
their full and complete effects. The essential 
truths of our religion appear so distinctly and so 
prominently in the revelation which God has 
given us, they are so conformable to our rea- 
son, and so agreeable to our natural sentiments, 
that they have never been wholly obscured and 
forgotten among Christians. Their operation, 
therefore, has been counteracted, but not en- 
tirely destroyed. Opposite truths and errors 
have existed in the same mind, and mutually 
controlled each other's influence. In many 
minds, these errors have existed merely in the 
form of speculation ; and have been met and 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. HI 

overborne, whenever they tended to any prac- 
tical result, by natural good sense, corredt 
moral principles, and sincere piety. The prac- 
tical religion of men is often a very dif- 
ferent thing from their professed religion; or 
from that contained in the creeds of the sect to 
which they consider themselves as belonging. 
Nor may we ever expect to see the whole oper- 
ation and perfect results of any false opinions, 
when those by whom they are maintained live 
intermixed with others, holding opposite doc- 
trines, whose numbers and character are such 
as to command respect. It is the tendency of 
the opposite opinions of various men to act 
upon and modify each other. A man without 
any religion will be a very different person, if 
he live in the midst of a religious community, 
from what he would have been in a society of 
men equally destitute of religious principle 
with himself; and the case is similar with him 
whose religion is erroneous. The characters of 
men are, without doubt, affected by many other 
causes beside the errors of the religious creed 
which they may profess. 

We believe, and we rejoice to believe, that 
there have been men of excellent virtue in every 
different faith. But in estimating the virtue, 
or rather the merit, of individuals, we are con- 



112 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

tinually making allowance for their difference 
of faith ; for the different degrees in which they 
have attained a knowledge of true religion, and 
of the character of its requirements. We do 
not expect certain virtues from men under the 
influence of certain errors. In giving the trib- 
ute of our admiration to the moral excellence 
of Socrates or of Cicero, we have to remember 
that Socrates and Cicero were heathens. In 
going back a century or two, if we would look 
without horror upon some who have passed 
even for saints, we must recollect, that they be- 
lieved religious persecution to be a duty. We 
are continually applying the same principle, 
often perhaps unconsciously, in judging of the 
characters of those whom we regard as holding 
great errors ; and frequently where such errors 
are entertained, though we may find much to 
praise, we find also, if not much to censure, at 
least much to regret. 

There have been excellent men, M^hose belief 
on the most important subjects has been very 
erroneous. But if any one should infer from 
this fact, that all different faiths are equally 
adapted to produce such men, and that there is 
no ground, therefore, in their practical effects, 
for preferring one to another, he would reason 
in the same manner, as if, having observed that 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 113 

some men retain their health and live long in 
insalubrious situations and unhealthy employ- 
ments, he should conclude that any one climate 
or mode of life is as favorable to health as an- 
other. The constitution of man, and the testi- 
mony of experience, would be overlooked in the 
latter inference no more than in the former. 
When it can be shown that men's opinions do 
not influence their conduct ; that there is an 
entire divorce between their intellect and their 
principles of action ; that men do not perform 
certain things, because they believe it to be their 
interest or duty to perform them ; and that re- 
ligion, which has been regarded as so active a 
principle in the production of both good and 
evil, is really nothing more than an inert sub- 
ject of speculation ; then it may be inferred, not 
indeed that it is wholly unimportant whether 
our religion be true or false, but that it is of 
little more importance than whether we believe 
the system of Newton or of Ptolemy respecting 
the material universe. 

To false religion we are indebted for perse- 
cutors, zealots, and bigots ; and perhaps hu- 
man depravity has assumed no form more 
odious than that in which it has appeared in 
such men. Persecution is passing away, we 
may trust, for ever ; and torture will no more 



10 



114 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

be inflicted, and murder no more committed, 
under pretence of extending the spirit and in- 
fluence of Christianity. But the temper which 
produced it still remains ; its parent bigotry 
is still in existence ; and what is there more 
adapted to excite disgust, than the disposi- 
tion, the feelings, the motives, the kind of in- 
tellect and degree of knowledge, discovered by 
some of those, who pretend to be the sole de- 
fenders and patrons of religious truth in this 
unhappy world, and the true and exclusive 
heirs of all the mercy of God '? It is a partic- 
ular misfortune, that, where gross errors in re- 
ligion prevail, the vices of which I speak show 
themselves especially in the clergy; and that 
we find them ignorant, narrow-minded, pre- 
sumptuous, and, as far as they have it in their 
power, oppressive and injurious. The disgust 
which this character, in those who appear as 
ministers of religion, naturally produces, is 
often transferred to Christianity itself It 
ought to be associated only with that form of 
religion by which those vices are occasioned. 
But such mistakes are continually made, be- 
cause men do not discriminate between the 
difi'erent systems of faith which have passed 
under the name of Christianity, nor recognize 
the very different effects which they are adapt- 
ed to produce. 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 115 

It is indeed questionable, whether the direct 
influence of the errors which have been con- 
nected with Christianity upon those by whom 
they are held, is equally mischievous with their 
indirect consequences. They are, it cannot be 
doubted, among the most operative causes of 
unbelief; and of what probably is much more 
common, and what we have so much reason to 
lament, indifference and scepticism in respect to 
religion. A system of doctrines is presented to 
men, at which their minds revolt ; and they are 
told that this is Christianity. A gospel is pro- 
posed to them, whose first aspect belies its 
name. If they are prevented from rejecting 
our religion altogether, by perceiving something 
of that character of divinity which belongs to 
it, and cannot be wholly obscured ; by the au- 
thority of so many excellent men who have 
regarded it as the foundation of their hopes ; 
and by some knowledge of the evidences of its 
truth ; yet such misrepresentations will not be 
without their effect. Men will in consequence 
of them regard religion as a subject of habit- 
ual doubt and perplexity, an irksome topic of 
contemplation, one from which their minds will 
be always ready to escape. It will thus be pre- 
vented from mingling with their thoughts ; it 
will not direct their common purposes ; it will 



116 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

not influence their affections ; it will not estab- 
lish its authority in their hearts. Such, indeed, 
will often be the case, even when, for want of 
knowing any thing better, they have at last 
brought themselves to assent to that creed in 
which alone religion has been distinctly pre- 
sented to their minds. 

The extravagant errors which have been 
forced into an unnatural union with Christian- 
ity may be traced back to ages, from which we 
consent to receive no other opinions. They 
derived their origin from men, whose specula- 
tions on every other subject would command 
at the present day but little deference. He 
would be regarded only with wonder or ridi- 
cule, who should think it worth while to quote 
Athanasius, or Augustine, or Calvin, or Turre- 
tin, as an authority upon any topic except the 
peculiar theological doctrines which they main- 
tained. The mysteries of the later Platonists, 
with the exception of the mystery of the Trin- 
ity, are at the present day treated with not 
much respect ; and, though the schoolmen have 
been our masters in matters of religion, we 
think it little worth while to study their writ- 
ings, and forget to whom we have been indebt- 
ed. Thus it is, that religious doctrines, which 
had their birth in ages of ignorance, of false 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 117 

principles, and false reasoning, still remain in 
full vigor; though all the rest of the brother- 
hood of errors, of which they made a part, have 
long since perished. They remain, disconnect- 
ed from all the modes of conception and habits 
of mind, among which they had their origin. 
They remain, standing insulated and unsup- 
ported, except by their connection with each 
other. They are at variance with all the 
knowledge, and all the opinions and sentiments, 
of our age upon every related subject. 

If we should take up any one of the standard 
authors upon these subjects, any one of those, 
whose reputation is highest, as a writer on nat- 
ural religion, on morals, on the science of the 
human mind, or as skilful in the development 
of the human character, and, in the midst of 
our reading, should chance to recollect some of 
the doctrines of technical theology, we should 
at once perceive how strangely they come 
athwart the whole current of our thoughts, 
and how irreconcilable they are with all that 
is best established in human knowledge. We 
are transferred from the region of all certain or 
probable truth, from all those topics of contem- 
plation among which the mind loves to dwell, 
into quite a new field of speculation, very bar- 
ren and hideous ; lying, if I may so speak, out 



118 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

of the limits of the habitable world. Let any 
one, while reading the fine arguments and 
beautiful illustrations of Paley respecting the 
goodness of God, bring to mind that doctrine 
which teaches that this is a ruined world, that 
far the greater portion of men are doomed 
from their birth to inevitable woe, that there is 
" a curse of God upon the creatures for our 
sake " ; and that, with the exception of a privi- 
leged few, who do not contribute much to 
brighten the prospect, we see nothing about us 
but sin and its punishments ; — in the shock, 
which this horrible doctrine will give to all the 
affections and feelings that fill his mind, he 
may perceive one proof, among many, of the 
direct contrariety, of which I speak, between 
what reason and revelation teach, and what has 
been taught by false theology ; between the tra- 
ditionary doctrines of the latter, and the best 
conclusions of enlightened philosophy. 

But we find that there are many claiming to 
be exclusively Christians, who insist that doc- 
trines, such as those to which I have alluded, 
constitute the essential truths and character- 
istic features of our religion ; and who raise a 
passionate outcry against all who endeavour to 
vindicate Christianity from this imputation. 
The creeds of every established church in 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 119 

Christendom teach such doctrines. The whole 
body of the clergy in every such church may 
be divided into three classes, — those who 
heartily believe the doctrines of their creed; 
the smallest number, I suspect, by far ; — those 
who, by repeated efforts, and by carefully limit- 
ing their inquiries, have succeeded in silencing 
their own doubts, and in persuading them- 
selves that these doctrines admit of a plausible 
defence ; — and, in the last place, a very consid- 
erable number indeed, and perhaps the most 
injurious to the interests of religion, those who 
give their solemn assent to the truth of doc- 
trines which they do not believe. And what is 
the consequence of all this 1 

Let us suppose an acute and intelligent man, 
occupied either in the affairs of the w^orld, in 
professional studies, or literary pursuits, and 
whose habits of life have in consequence been 
such as to leave him little leisure to make him- 
self acquainted with the science of theology. 
Let us suppose, that, from the circumstances of 
his situation, some one of those systems of er- 
ror, which have assumed the name of Chris- 
tianity, should have been continually presented 
to him as Christianity itself How is he to de- 
termine that this pretension is not founded in 
truth ] How is he to know, that what is pub- 



120 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

licly announced as the religion of Christ, and 
what those around him, who profess to be best 
acquainted with the subject, affirm to be the 
religion of Christ, does not in fact deserve the 
name] By such a man, the popular system 
would for the most part hardly be thought to 
deserve serious attention ; especially if he 
should find, that it was in fact disbelieved by a 
considerable portion of those whose business it 
is to teach it. If he should happen to take up 
some one of those books which contain an ex- 
position and defence of any of the principal 
forms of error which our religion has been 
made to assume, it is easy to imagine with 
what contempt and weariness, with what won- 
der and disgust, he would turn over the pages. 
It is not difficult to conceive how surprisingly 
trifling and inane many of those statements, 
which we theologians are accustomed by cour- 
tesy to call arguments, would appear to one fa- 
miliar with common modes of discussion, and 
with what may be called the practical reason- 
ing of men. 

Eeligion is not respected, because it is not 
understood ; because a low, earth-born rival has 
assumed the name and place of that principle 
whose origin is from heaven. Can we think it 
wonderful, that there should be many in every 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 121 

Christian country, who come to feel little re- 
spect for a subject which has never been fairly 
presented to their minds, which has always 
been connected with associations that are offen- 
sive or degrading, and about which those have 
often written and talked the most, who have 
said nothing but what tended to misrepresent 
it and expose it to contempt] We see every- 
where the manifest effects of the state of things 
to which I have adverted. It is not necessary 
to consider the condition of Catholic countries, 
where the monstrous corruptions which have 
been connected with Christianity have left it 
scarcely any disciples, except among the lower 
and more ignorant classes of society. We may 
see enough of the disastrous consequences of 
error in Protestant countries, in our own neigh- 
borhood, among those whom we meet in the 
common intercourse of life. By the causes 
which have been mentioned, we may account 
in a great measure for the phenomenon, that, 
of the most eminent literary men of Scotland 
for the last sixty or seventy years, so many have 
been open enemies, or very doubtful friends, of 
Christianity. Turn over the pages of the most 
popular and able literary journal of our times, 
which has exercised so much influence upon 
the minds of thousands of readers, and than 
11 



122 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

which few publications have tended more to 
mark and distinguish the present age ; — you 
cannot but be struck, I do not say with the in- 
fidelity which has occasionally appeared in a 
few articles, but with a characteristic far more 
deserving of notice, and suggesting thoughts 
more serious ; — it is the general exclusion of 
every religious topic, and of nearly all direct 
reference to Christianity. You would produce 
scarcely a perceptible change in the character 
of the work by striking out every thing which 
implies that such a religion as Christianity 
exists in the world. Whatever relates to the 
highest interests and noblest speculations of 
man is excluded ; as if these subjects lay out 
of the sphere of all true and useful knowledge ; 
nay, as if there would be something of imperti- 
nence and folly in introducing topics, borrowed 
from religion, into writings really intended to 
influence the sentiments and conduct of the 
more intelligent classes of society. Whether a 
man believe the truths of religion or not, he 
must have an intellect singularly constituted, if 
he affect to despise them. But the doctrines of 
false theology have long outlived the time when 
they could command any respect, except from 
those whose minds have been disciplined to 
their reception; and, if we will insist on mis- 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 123 

taking the latter for the former, it is not 
strange that such effects should be produced as 
we see existing. 

But the subject presents itself under a still 
more gloomy aspect. What must be the effect 
of any of those systems of faith which have as- 
sumed the name of orthodoxy, when urged up- 
on the reception of the young'? What must 
be the effect, when such a system, with its hid- 
eous features, and squalid with all the bar- 
barism of a rude and ignorant age, is obtruded 
upon a mind of warm affections, of unperverted 
and undisciplined feelings, of quick sensibility, 
and impatient, hasty, and petulant in its judg- 
ments ? Take such a young man, and persuade 
him, if you can, to read through the standards 
of doctrine which your church has sanctioned ; 
no matter whether that church be episcopal or 
presbyterian, and no matter whether your stand- 
ard be the Westminster Catechisms and Con- 
fession, or the Thirty-nine Articles. Tell him 
that this is your religion, and must be his. 
Lay before him your aggregate of unintelligible 
doctrines concerning God, and of doctrines 
which are but too intelligible concerning the 
condition and prospects of man ; and tell him 
that the creed which you put into his hands 
contains a full exposition of all that is consola- 



124 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

tory and delightful and lovely and glorious in 
religion. If you can bring him to contemplate 
and understand what you have laid before him, 
have you any doubt with what aversion he will 
regard your religion ] 

The different systems of religious error which 
have prevailed among Christians have usually 
been employed as very efficacious instruments 
in effecting the worldly and criminal purposes 
of those by whom they have been most zeal- 
ously supported. They have been made to 
pander to the ambition and vices of unholy 
men, pretending to be ministers of God and 
Christ. They have been brought into intimate 
union with corrupt civil institutions ; and, when 
guarded by the sword of the law, they have lib- 
erally repaid the support which they have re- 
ceived, by employing in their turn the terrors 
and artifices of superstition to humble the 
minds of men. True religion can be the min- 
ister of nothing but good. But false religion 
may be made an agent in the production of al- 
most any sort of evil. It is of its very essence 
to misdirect and misemploy the sanctions which 
it holds forth. 

In proof of this, it is not necessary to look 
back to the period, when a despotism the most 
odious and degrading was established over Eu- 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 125 

rope under the name of the Church of Christ ; 
and when the pretended authority of our relig- 
ion was made a shelter for rank and foul in- 
iquity. It is better to regard the more mod- 
erate evils of our own time, and to take exam- 
ples, which, if not quite so impressive, have a 
more practical bearing. In every country of 
Europe, there are without doubt many, who 
regard religion merely as a part of the political 
machinery of the state, and a powerful instru- 
ment in preserving and strengthening the exist- 
ing distinctions of society; who, on the one 
side, view its establishments as a means of ex- 
erting power and patronage, and, on the other, 
as a source from which rank and wealth may 
be derived. The style and temper in which the 
national religion is defended often borrow their 
character from the kind of estimation in which 
it is held. There is a worldly, political, inter- 
ested zeal shown in its defence, betraying an 
origin very different from the spirit of Chris- 
tianity. It is a zeal for their own profit, and 
not for the happiness of their fellow-creatures, 
which engages men in its support. Its corrup- 
tions are strenuously defended. All examina- 
tion and all improvement are angrily repelled. 
The work of reformation must not be begun ; 
for, if it be suffered to begin, who can tell where 
11* 



126 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

it will stop ] Who can tell how many profit- 
able and convenient evils will be removed, or 
how much that is now tolerated will be 
marked out for reprobation ? In the defenders, 
therefore, of the established faith, in such writ- 
ers, for instance, as Horsley, we often find a 
tone of authority, the insolence of artificial 
rank, and that gross and impudent unfairness, 
on which few men will venture, unless they 
know that there is a strong party ready to cheer 
them as victors, whatever may be their real suc- 
cess. If its defenders do not write altogether 
in the style of those controvertists of former 
days, who knew that the executioner was at 
hand to give them aid ; they nevertheless write 
like men, who feel that they have the power of 
the state on their side, and who are far more 
solicitous to maintain than to justify what is 
established. In such a state of things, true and 
useful learning ceases in a great measure to be 
cultivated by the clergy. Those of them who 
make their creed a matter of conscience, often 
find it safest not to examine too curiously the 
history or the doctrines of the faith w^hich they 
are required to profess. Their creed presents 
itself to them on every side as a check to all 
liberal inquiry in the studies peculiar to their 
station. Nor is much inquiry found necessary ; 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 127 

for their church, with its established institu- 
tions and doctrines, relies for support on a 
power, which aifords it quite another sort of 
aid than what the learning and talents of its 
ministers might furnish. 

But a deficiency of learning and talents is 
often far from being the worst characteristic of 
the clergy of such an establishment. When, 
as is commonly the case, its offices are consid- 
ered principally as means of affording patron- 
age, or of securing rank and emolument, men 
who possess very different qualifications from 
those necessary for their proper discharge, will 
be most successful in obtaining them. A large 
portion of the professed ministers of religion 
will then be found not merely ignorant and in- 
ert, but destitute of religious principles and 
feelings, without belief in any faith, worthless 
and profligate. In the character of a great part 
of the French clergy during the last century, 
when the highest offices of the church were 
filled by the nominations of the atheist Regent, 
Duke of Orleans, and of the brutal debauchee, 
Louis the Fifteenth, we may perceive an exam- 
ple of what has been said. In the contempt 
and utter discredit which such clergymen must 
have cast upon religion, — the great principle 
that holds human passions in restraint, and 



128 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

unites man to man, — we may perceive a cause 
which alone is almost sufficient to account for 
the awful disruption of society that followed. 

But, long before the evils of a corrupt estab- 
lishment have become so glaring, it is easy to 
perceive its effects upon the mind of the laity. 
Their respect for religion, when not merely as- 
sumed as a matter of policy, becomes in a great 
part ceremonial, exterior, and worldly, the re- 
spect of those who mistake what is in fact noth- 
ing more than mere vulgar pride in the dignity 
of their church, for something corresponding to 
religious sentiment and principle. It is a re- 
spect for a particular form of faith and worship, 
produced very much by its associations with 
antiquity, and solemn buildings, and imposing 
ceremonies, and high rank, and the power of 
the state. Nay, where ignorance and supersti- 
tion gain complete establishment, as in Spain 
during the last century, all regard for religion 
may degenerate at last into mere bigotry to a 
name, accompanied with the mechanical and 
perfectly unmeaning observance of appointed 
ceremonies. 

Among an ignorant and superstitious people, 
there may be a certain traditionary and exterior 
respect, and even zeal, for their religion, while 
the ministers of that religion are regarded with 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 129 

dislike and contempt. " With all this attach- 
ment to forms and ceremonies," says an enlight- 
ened traveller, speaking of the religion of 
Spain, " it might naturally be expected that the 
clergy would be looked upon as objects of ven- 
eration ; but, as far as I can judge, this is by no 
means the case. The language held towards 
the ministers of religion is not always respect- 
ful, and is sometimes scurrilous." * This sin- 
gular phenomenon exists, in a greater or less 
degree, in other parts of Europe. But it can- 
not exist long where any considerable degree 
of intellectual improvement prevails. As soon 
as the mind ceases to be the mere slave of hab- 
its and prejudices on which reason has never 
acted, one of its first rude operations will be to 
transfer those sentiments, with which it has re- 
garded the ministers of religion, to religion it- 
self, and to associate them with it. Eespect for 
religion can hardly exist, in an enlightened com- 
munity, separate from respect for its ministers. 

When the religion publicly taught is of such 
a character that reason turns away from it, and 
refuses to acknowledge its authority, it can have 
but a weak hold on the minds of the more in- 
telligent, and exercise but little influence on 

* Jacob's Travels in the South of Spain, p. 93. 



130 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

their habitual aiFections and daily conduct. 
But there is a spurious sort of religion of the 
imagination and of temporary sentiment, which 
sometimes supplies the place of the religion of 
the understanding. There is such desolation 
and heartlessness in utter scepticism, that we 
are ready to turn from it even to a shadowy, 
unsubstantial image of the truth. The resem- 
blance may indeed be preferred to the reality ; 
for, if it has far less of joy and hope, it is also 
far less awful and authoritative. Where real, 
living religion does not exercise its permanent, 
unremitting influence, we may often find in its 
stead a poetical, theatrical, mystical religion, 
which may furnish themes for the expression of 
fine sentiment, and the indulgence of transient 
emotion ; which delights to talk about sacrifi- 
ces, but forgets duties, and has nothing to do 
with the unnoticed patience of obscure suffer- 
ing, the unpraised self-denials of humble good- 
ness, the strong and silent feelings of habitual 
piety, or indeed with any virtues, but what are 
splendid and popular and fit for exhibition. It 
is such a religion as the authoress of " Del- 
phine " has celebrated with her passionate and 
enthusiastic eloquence. It is this religion 
which the writer of the " Philosophical Diction- 
ary," not to mention any work more infamous. 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 131 

could introduce into his tragedies ; and it is for 
such a religion that Moore and Byron may com- 
pose sacred songs. Nobody, I trust, will so far 
misunderstand me, as to suppose it my inten- 
tion to deny that the sentiments expressed by 
such writers are sometimes beautiful and cor- 
rect. I only mean, that there is a religion, not 
of the understanding, and not of the heart, 
which terminates in the expression of fine sen- 
timents. 

Such, then, as I have described, and so great, 
are the evils which result from false notions of 
religion. They can be removed only by estab- 
lishing the truth ; and, to this end, the truth 
must be earnestly avowed and defended, with 
a deep-felt conviction of its value to mankind. 
It is indeed an unpleasant thing to encounter 
prejudices, however mischievous, when among 
those who hold them there are many, very esti- 
mable for their virtues, who consider our pro- 
fessions as insincere, and our labors as profane ; 
and who therefore regard us with much harsher 
feelings of dislike, than common collisions of 
opinion are apt to produce. But, allowing this 
to be as great an evil as you will, it must still 
be weighed against those evils which it is your 
purpose to remove ; and it is but dust in the 
balance. There is no way in which the truth 



132 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

can be made to prevail, except by the direct 
avowal of it ; by the forcible and full statement 
of the arguments by which it is supported ; and 
by a close encounter with opposite errors. Un- 
less the truth be clearly stated and defended, 
it is not easy to see how it can be made to pre- 
vail on any disputed subject ; and there is cer- 
tainly no other way in which you can hope to 
remove prejudices so widely spread, and so ob- 
stinately maintained, as those respecting relig- 
ion. Yet this encounter of truth with error is 
religious controversy, of the ill consequences of 
which we sometimes hear so much, as well from 
those who are entitled to respect, as from those 
who are not. But it is a fact, though one not 
universally recognized, that the manly, well- 
tempered, steady avowal of the truth tends far 
more to repress, than to excite, the bitter and 
angry passions of our opponents. It has its ef- 
fect upon all honest and fair minds; for the 
tones of deep earnestness and strong convic- 
tion can hardly be mistaken or misrepresented. 
It has its effect upon minds of a different char- 
acter ; for, where there is no great superiority 
of vantage-ground, reproach and insult are 
found in time to be but poor weapons against 
that sword, with which truth is furnished 
" from the armory of God." 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 133 

The real, practical opinions of wise and vir- 
tuous men of different sects correspond, with- 
out doubt, much more nearly than their creeds. 
But these creeds determine, in a greater or less 
degree, the faith of the generality ; and it is idle 
to turn away our eyes, and endeavor to keep 
out of sight their direct opposition to each oth- 
er in regard to doctrines the most momentous. 
Between the extremes of truth and error, we 
may find also every shade of professed belief, in 
proportion as men have examined more or less 
thoroughly, and with more or less honest free- 
dom. But, while these various, wide, and most 
important differences exist in the professed faith 
of Christians, the minds of many will be con- 
founded and lost in the search after truth, if 
those who are able do not step forward to as- 
sist and guide their inquiries. It is very desir- 
able that men should give up their old errors ; 
for these errors have been exceedingly perni- 
cious ; but there is danger lest he, whose faith 
has rested principally on authority, and who 
has learned to doubt and dismiss one doctrine 
after another, should begin to distrust the 
whole system of religion. There is danger 
that he will be unable to distinguish for him- 
self between its essential truths, and those 
errors of human origin w^hich have been so 

12 



134 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

blended with it ; and that, in rejecting the lat- 
ter, he will at the same time lose his reverence 
for the former. In order to prevent this conse- 
quence, it is necessary for the defenders of real 
religion to separate, and to distinguish most 
clearly, these truths from those errors ; to draw 
a broad and deep line of demarcation between 
them, and to render evident the essential oppo- 
sition in their character and effects. It is ne- 
cessary for them to make it felt, to place it out 
of dispute, that it is not any childish and petu- 
lant love of innovation, nor any contemptible 
desire of attracting notice by assailing men's 
prejudices, but that it is their interest in true 
religion, their conviction of the value of Chris- 
tianity, and their desire of promoting its influ- 
ence, which are their motives in opposing doc- 
trines, by which, as they think, its value has 
been obscured, and its influence obstructed. 
They must show what they maintain, and why 
they maintain it ; what they oppose, and why 
they oppose it. They must explain themselves, 
prudently and wisely as they may, but very 
earnestly and explicitly. 

There is, beyond doubt, great reason to re- 
joice in what has been already effected toward 
vindicating the true character of Christianity. 
But even in those communities where it is best 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 135 

understood, much, very much, remains to be 
done, before correct notions of religion can be 
fully developed, and exhibited in all their rela- 
tions and bearings, and before our religion can 
be distinctly recognized, and received by men 
in all its purity and power. Old errors meet 
and embarrass us on every side. One false 
doctrine retreats upon another for support. 
There are many difficulties to be removed ; 
many inquiries to be answered ; and many hon- 
est doubts to be solved, which have their origin 
not in the nature of things, but in long estab- 
lished prejudices. The light is as yet mixed 
and cloudy. The truth itself, in many minds, 
rests upon a foundation not perfectly secure, 
and requiring to be strengthened. There are 
many ready to believe it, and who do believe it, 
but whose faith requires to be enlightened and 
confirmed. There are many whose opinions, 
though prevailingly correct, are, in a consider- 
able degree, undefined, hesitating, and incon- 
sistent. There are others in a state of painful 
uncertainty. Under these circumstances, there 
is a call for instruction and guidance, which 
those who are able to afford them are not at 
liberty to decline answering. Our fellow-Chris- 
tians are in need of such knowledge as may en- 
able them to attain distinct and full conceptions 



136 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

of religion, and to embrace it with a satisfied 
mind and earnest faith. If it be in our power 
to dispense the bread of instruction and life, 
it will surely be our guilt if we suffer them to 
complain, that they " look up and are not fed." 
But, in communicating this knowledge, we 
cannot advance a step without encountering 
one prejudice or another. There is nothing 
we can teach, which will not be contradict- 
ed. There is nothing we can propose, which 
will not be cavilled at. There is no informa- 
tion we can communicate, which will not be 
disputed. Every plan, apparently the most un- 
exceptionable, for advancing religious knowl- 
edge will meet with opposition ; for, as this 
knowledge advances, some favorite error must 
fall before it. Let us consider one example. 
For the last century, there have been reiterated 
and strong complaints of the imperfection, er- 
rors, and obscurity of the common English ver- 
sion of the Bible. There is a series of author- 
ities to this purpose, collected by Archbishop 
Newcome,* no mean authority himself. They 
are taken from writers of different communions 
and belief, some of them of the first eminence 

* In his work entitled " An Historical View of the English Bib- 
lical Translations: the Expediency of Revising, by xAuthority, our 
present Translation : and the Means of Executing such a Revision." 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 137 

as critics and theologians, and all of them more 
or less distinguished. To those whom he has 
quoted, many more of a similar character might 
easily be added ; and it may be doubted wheth- 
er there is a name of any weight to be placed 
in the opposite scale. In England, there has 
been a call from within the Church, and from 
without, for what Bishop Lowth has spoken of 
as " that necessary work, a new translation, or 
a revision of the present translation, of the Holy 
Scriptures," by public authority. And how 
much has been effected in consequence ] Noth- 
ing. The jealousy of all change has stood in 
the way of all improvement. Those who have 
felt that they, personally, might hazard some- 
thing, and could gain nothing, by any altera- 
tion, seem to have cared little whether religion 
might gain any thing or not. Even in our 
country, where it is unsupported by public au- 
thority, the version of King James's translators, 
erroneous as it is, and in considerable portions 
of it unintelligible, at least in any correct sense, 
has attained the same reputation and currency 
as in England. It is the only version in com- 
mon use, the only one distributed by our Bible 
Societies, the only one read in our pulpits ; and, 
till within a few years, no other version of any 
part of the Scriptures could have been readily 

12* 



138 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

procured in our country. It seems to be for- 
gotten by many, that it is merely a faulty trans- 
lation ; and they appear to regard it with the 
same reverence as if it were the very original 
of the holy writings. True zeal for the Scrip- 
tures would make us earnest to furnish the best, 
the very best, means of understanding them cor- 
rectly and fully. But there is a pretended zeal 
for the Scriptures, which has shown itself in a 
quite different manner; and has opposed, di- 
rectly or indirectly, every effort for the purpose. 

This is only one instance, out of many, of the 
resistance which all attempts to communicate 
religious knowledge have met with, and will 
meet with hereafter. Nothing can be effected 
without a struggle and a contest ; and he who 
has a philosophical or an Epicurean dislike to 
controversy, who is fearful lest it should injure 
his temper, or put his dignity to hazard, or en- 
danger his reputation, or disturb his quiet, may 
assure himself, that he is not such an instru- 
ment as is required in the work of enlightening 
and reforming his fellow-men. The Sybarites 
might as well have been called in to assist in 
establishing the fortunes of the Eternal City. 

But there is a very different class of men 
whose aid is not desirable in the attempt to 
purify our religion. They are men, intemper- 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 139 

ate, imprudent, distinguished by their levity 
of judgment, ready to believe that the further 
they remove from established opinions the 
more they show themselves free from vulgar 
prejudices, fond of paradoxes, valuing opinions 
for their novelty and not for their correctness, 
taking pleasure in presenting even the truth in 
a form the most offensive to their opponents, 
unable to recognize the different appearances 
vrhich the same essential belief may assume ac- 
cording to the various characters of different 
minds, understanding little, and valuing less, 
the judgment and toleration with which the 
soundest principles are sometimes to be avow- 
ed, and having for their principal object to gain 
a worthless sort of notoriety on the ground of 
being original thinkers. They commonly agree 
with the defenders of true religion, if they agree 
at all, only in attacking certain errors, and not 
in maintaining the great truths of our faith. 
But the latter is the main object, ever to be kept 
in view ; and those errors are to be controverted 
because they are inconsistent with these truths. 
Such auxiliaries are more to be feared than any 
opponents. They resemble the predatory bands 
which accompany the march of an army, excit- 
ing ill-will and dread in a friendly country, and 
of no use in that of an enemy. 



140 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

There is, it may be believed, a Reformation 
of religion now taking place, of not less impor- 
tance than that to which the name has been so 
long appropriated. The purposes of God, in 
giving Christianity to men, have not yet been 
fully unfolded. Without doubt, its truths, 
notwithstanding the mass of errors with which 
they have been encumbered, have been contin- 
ually operating to raise the character, and im- 
prove the condition, of man. But, I trust, the 
providence of God, in conferring this blessing 
on our race, looked far forward, to ages much 
beyond our own. There are indications of a 
period, when the truths, and, in consequence, 
the evidences, of our religion will be much bet- 
ter understood than at present. 

But it is strange, it may be said, that a reve- 
lation from God should have been so long 
mingled with so much human error. You 
think it strange, then, that he did not, by one 
vast miracle, annihilate in a moment all those 
errors respecting religion and duty, which thou- 
sands of years had been accumulating in the 
world ; that he did not sweep away at once all 
prejudices from the minds of men, so that his 
truth might find unresisted entrance, and hold 
undisputed sway; and that he did not after- 
ward, by a perpetual act of his power, so 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 141 

strengthen their understandings, and so restrain 
their passions and follies, that no false opin- 
ions should, in any time to come, be introduced 
and maintained. Examine the history of opin- 
ions, and you will find that errors, either in re- 
ligion or philosophy, which have once generally 
prevailed, are very slowly removed and super- 
seded. Common modes of conception, and the 
popular belief, are transmitted from one gener- 
ation to another, like the traditionary customs 
of the East. However unreasonable they may 
be, it is for the most part only by a very grad- 
ual process that they are corrected. The men 
of one generation are the instructors of the 
next. Coming ignorant into the world, we are 
compelled first to receive what others may teach 
us ; to believe, under their direction, before we 
can exercise our own judgment ; and when our 
instructors have been in error, it takes us a 
long time to discover the fact, and there are 
few who are able to discover it at all. The 
world is very slow and dull in unlearning its 
prejudices. Ealse doctrines, which sprang up 
long before the introduction of Christianity, 
subsequently became connected with it, shoot- 
ing their branches among its truths, and twin- 
ing close around them, so as almost to conceal 
them from view by their rank and poisonous 



142 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

luxuriance. The same false doctrines still re- 
main flourishing. In opposing the errors of 
Christians, we are in fact often opposing only 
the errors of heathen philosophy, a little dis- 
guised, and somewhat modified by time and cir- 
cumstances. 

That so much error should have been incor- 
porated with Christianity, or rather, that Chris- 
tians should have fallen into so many errors on 
the subject of religion (for that is the true mode 
of stating the fact), does not seem very difiicult 
to be accounted for, when we consider how 
much there is in the intellectual, and still more 
in the moral imperfections of man, which may 
lead him to embrace readily false conceptions 
of his highest relations and duties ; when we 
acquaint ourselves with the erroneous doctrines 
in philosophy, religion, and morals, which pre- 
vailed throughout the civilized world at the 
time of the introduction of our religion ; and 
when we further recollect how very slow and 
reluctant are the changes which take place in 
the opinions of large bodies of men, even under 
the operation of the most powerful causes. 
That men should retain their errors in oppo- 
sition to the clearest discoveries of revelation 
was not more wonderful eighteen centuries ago, 
than it is at the present day. It is not more 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 143 

wonderful, than that they should retain them, 
in opposition to the clearest discoveries of rea- 
son. 

The dark ages were the triumph and con- 
summation of the errors and vices which were 
in the world when Christianity was introduced. 
Our religion struggled against them and de- 
layed their progress ; and our religion at last 
delivered men from the slavery in which they 
were enthralled. It is to the spirit of Chris- 
tianity that the regeneration of Europe is to be 
ascribed. There were men, who, if they had 
but imperfect notions of the real character of 
God's revelation, yet felt the power of some of 
its truths ; and these were the men who made 
successful resistance to the evils by which the 
world was oppressed. Without that elevation 
and energy of mind which the belief of immor- 
tality inspires, without those motives which 
Christianity alone affords, without that strong 
feeling of right and wrong which Christian 
morals alone produce, and without that spirit 
of self-devotion which is the spirit of our relig- 
ion, I know not how the deliverance of man- 
kind from the reign of darkness could have 
been eiFected. I know not what better hope 
there would have been for Europe, than there 
is now for Turkey ; or why it might not have 



144 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

continued to lie in the same state of degrada- 
tion, moral and intellectual, as that in which 
almost all Asia has been sunk for at least two 
thousand years. 

Since its commencement, the work of im- 
provement has been continually carried for- 
ward ; and we now breathe a free air and en- 
joy a blessed light, such as were never known 
before. But the work of improvement has 
been an arduous and severe struggle, a bitter 
conflict. The errors of men on the most im- 
portant subjects have been in alliance with 
their selfishness and their vices ; and they have 
together maintained their ground with deter- 
mined perseverance. Our religious and moral 
improvement has been purchased by severe 
thought and laborious investigation, by high- 
minded sacrifices of worldly hopes, by a gener- 
ous contempt of reproach and persecution, by 
tears and blood. "Wise men have spent them- 
selves in painful and thankless labors, and holy 
men have sufiered and died, to procure for us 
the privileges which we enjoy. In tracing the 
melancholy history of our race, it is to such 
characters that we must turn for consolation. 
They give us pledges, on which we may rely, of 
the worth of man. They have followed in the 
track of pure splendor, in which their great 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 145 

Master ascended to heaven. They have carried 
on the grand scheme of moral reformation 
which he began, against similar opposition to 
what he encountered. They have continued 
the work of glory and suffering, which he com- 
mitted to his Apostles. They have purchased 
ingratitude at the same price which saints and 
philosophers had paid before. There have been 
men, who, in the cause of truth and virtue, have 
made no compromises for their own advantage 
or safety; who have recognized "the hardest 
duty as the highest " ; who, conscious of the 
possession of great talents, have relinquished 
all the praise which they might have so liberally 
received, if they had not thrown themselves in 
opposition to the errors and vices of their fel- 
low-men, and have been content to take oblo- 
quy and insult instead ; who have approached 
to lay on the altar of God " their last infirmity." 
They have felt that deep conviction of having 
acted right, which supported the martyred phi- 
losopher of Athens, when he asked, "What 
disgrace is it to me, if others are unable to 
judge of me, or to treat me as they ought ] " * 
There is something very solemn and sublime in 



* — " €[Jioi be TL alaxpov to irepovs firj BvvaaOai Trepl ip-ov ra 
YiKaia p.r]Te yvcovai, p-rire Troirjcrat ; ' ' 
13 



146 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

the feeling produced by considering how differ- 
ently these men have been estimated by their 
contemporaries, from the manner in which they 
are regarded by God. We perceive the appeal 
which lies from the ignorance, the folly, and 
the iniquity of man, to the throne of Eternal 
Justice. A storm of calumny and reviling pur- 
sued them through life, and continued, when 
they could no longer feel it, to beat upon their 
graves. But it is no matter. They have gone 
where all who have suffered, and all who have 
triumphed, in the same noble cause, receive their 
reward ; but where the wreath of the martyr is 
more glorious than that of the conqueror.* 

There is no sufficient support for good mor- 
als ; there is no security for the common bless- 
ings of civilized life; there is no power ade- 
quate to raise the condition of man, and to re- 

* Such examples Milton delighted to contemplate and follow ; and 
it was the contemplation of such human examples which produced 
the inspiration of the following passage : — 

" Servant of God, well done ! well hast thou fought 
The better iight, who single hast maintained 
Against revolted multitudes the cause 

Of truth: 

And for the testimony of truth hast borne 

Universal reproach, far worse to bear 

Than violence : for this was all thy care, 

To stand approved in sight of God, though worlds 

Judged thee perverse." 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 147 

move the vices and miseries which press so 
heavily upon human society, except correct re- 
ligious principle. By comparing our own con- 
dition with the condition of those who have pre- 
ceded us, we may perceive that it has already 
effected not a little. But more than w^e can es- 
timate remains to be done ; and there is much, 
which, through the blessing of God, we may 
hope will hereafter be accomplished. We seem, 
indeed, to be gathering but the first unripe fruits, 
and enjoying but a little foretaste of the rich 
abundance which is promised. There have been 
times of ignorance and infamous imposture, of 
violence and triumphant iniquity, when it was 
no small praise for those who were contending 
in the cause of human improvement, that they 
had not despaired of mankind ; quod non despe- 
r as sent de rehus humanis. They, like the Tro- 
jan hero, have asked for no omen, but that one 
best omen, — eh olcovo^ apiaTo^, — the cause in 
which they were engaged. But we are living 
in a different state of things. 

There are, without doubt, those, to whom all 
extended regard for the happiness and improve- 
ment of their fellow-men seems an idle and vis- 
ionary thing. It is lamentable that it should 
be so ; and it is a lamentable mistake, if any 
one, feeling this indifference, supposes, at the 



148 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

same time, that he has the spirit of that relig- 
ion, whose founder " came, not to be served, but 
to serve, and to give his life a ransom for 
many." But there is a living spring of virtue 
and happiness, whose waters have as yet been 
not a little choked up, and its channels not a 
little obstructed. There is a purifying and an- 
imating principle, whose influences have as yet 
been very partially felt. It is true, rational, 
practical religion. Has this no tendency, and 
no power, to produce those effects, which every 
good and every wise man must desire so ar- 
dently ] Even if experience had not long ago 
answered the question, still there could be no 
doubt what answer must be given. We are 
every day witnessing its effects upon the char- 
acters of those around us. 

Imperfect as the best of men may be, there 
are in every rank of life those, whom if all 
were like, the world would present a wonder- 
fully different aspect from what it does at pres- 
ent. How have the characters of such men 
been formed ] How is it that those whom we 
can most trust, esteem, and love, have become 
what they are] The general answer is, that 
their characters have been formed under the in- 
fluence of religious principle, by the continual 
action of those great practical truths which re- 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 149 

ligion enforces. They may be of different sects ; 
they may profess different creeds ; they may 
even fancy that they are wide asimder from each 
other ; but they are not. Their practical relig- 
ion is the same. There is but one kind of prac- 
tical religion in the world. It consists of those 
great, all-important truths, which wise and good 
men hold in common. It is to these truths, 
that we wish to give their full, unimpeded 
efficacy. It is these truths, which we wish to 
bring into action, unembarrassed and unop- 
posed by the errors that have been connected 
with them. It is for these truths, which have 
been the master principles in forming the char- 
acters of the most excellent of men, that we 
wish to procure more general reception ; and it 
is for these truths, that we would vindicate 
their preeminent authority. All our hopes for 
the welfare of man are identified with our hopes 
for the prevalence of true religion. And this is 
opposed, and has been opposed but too eftectu- 
ally, by those false doctrines, for which so many 
are yet earnestly contending. They are among 
the chief causes counteracting that one great 
cause, to which we must look almost alone for 
the production of good. The rational and en- 
lightened Christian, when he finds men zealous- 
ly and pertinaciously defending errors, which 

13* 



150 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

grossly misrepresent our religion and expose it 
to disbelief and contempt, will be ready to use 
language like that which Tertullian addressed 
to the heretics of his time, Parce spei unicm 
mu7idi, — " Spare the only hope of mankind." 

In our endeavors to promote the influence of 
rational religion, what are the obstacles which 
present themselves] They are, in the first 
place, prescriptive errors and traditionary prej- 
udices. But these are every day losing their 
strength. They are those selfish and vile pas- 
sions, by which every effort of the moralist and 
philosopher, no matter what form it may as- 
sume, is equally opposed. These present, there- 
fore, no peculiar discouragement in the present 
case. Are the truths for which we contend in- 
trinsically difficult to be understood ] They are 
not so. They are as simple and intelligible as 
they are sublime. The prospect which true re- 
ligion opens to the mind has a beautiful and 
solemn grandeur, to which that of the visible 
heavens affords but a faint comparison ; but it 
is with one as with the other; we need not 
travel far, nor search for our point of view, in 
order to behold all that is given us to see of the 
moral or of the physical universe. 

Is it impossible to render the practical op- 
eration of these truths more general and effect- 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 151 

ive? Is it impossible, when religion joins her 
voice to that which experience has been so long 
uttering, to make men believe and feel, at last, 
that their duty and their interest are the same ; 
that the laws of God are but directions which 
he has given us, in his infinite wisdom and mer- 
cy, for attaining our highest happiness ; that it 
is better to be just and benevolent, honored and 
beloved, than to be selfish, unjust, and cruel, 
despised, distrusted, and hated; that it is un- 
wise to sacrifice a great future good to a pres- 
ent indulgence, which leaves behind it dissatis- 
faction and repentance ; and that he who sub- 
mits the moral part of his nature to the animal, 
is degrading himself, and destroying his best 
capacities for enjoyment '? Is it impossible 
that the generality of men in a Christian land 
should be brought to act as if they really be- 
lieved these truths, and truths such as these 1 
Whether it be so or not, yet remains to be de- 
termined. The experiment has never been 
made. These principles have, indeed, gov- 
erned the lives of many. They are familiar to 
the moralist, the philosopher, and the well edu- 
cated man. The whole revelation of Jesus 
Christ was intended to enforce these truths. 
But they have not been enforced, nor have they 
been taught in the popular systems of religion. 



152 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

These systems have made a wide separation be- 
tween real virtue, and what they have taught 
men to consider as the characteristics of a 
Christian. 

Do you believe that the religion of Spain or 
Italy has had an effect to elevate and purify 
the morals and the minds of the inhabitants of 
those countries, at all corresponding to the ef- 
fect which true Christianity would have pro- 
duced ? Do you receive our faith in its purity, 
and can you believe that the doctrines of Cal- 
vin have had any tendency to develop the 
higher powers and better affections of man 1 
Do you believe that they have flourished under 
such culture; and that those doctrines have 
really operated to produce reverence, love, and 
gratitude toward Him who has formed us un- 
der his curse, and active and warm-hearted 
benevolence toward the thoroughly depraved 
and inexpressibly odious beings, our fellow- 
men 1 

The tendency of every prevalent system of 
false religion has been to call away the atten- 
tion of men from the practice of moral good- 
ness, and to direct it to some other object. Ail 
such systems have presented some substitute 
for what pure religion requires. They have 
misapplied the sanctions of Christianity, divert- 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 153 

ing them from their great purpose. They have 
provided some hiding-place and shelter for the 
baser passions ; and these, in return, have often 
been most zealous in their defence. This is the 
great characteristic distinction between true re- 
ligion and false ; that the former directs all its 
motives and sanctions to the production of real 
moral excellence; and that the latter sets up 
something else as the object of its requisitions 
and promises. The reception of a creed, the 
belonging to a particular sect, zeal for the 
Church, zeal for orthodoxy, even a readiness 
to engage in the work of persecution, the inflic- 
tion upon one's self of bodily torture, the prac- 
tice of useless austerities, the endurance of use- 
less privations, pardons for sin purchased with 
money from a miserable fellow-sinner, reliance 
upon substituted merit, a fancied miraculous 
change of character, the being elected to salva- 
tion by an arbitrary and irreversible decree, — 
these, and other similar distinctions and means, 
have all been represented, in various forms of 
false religion among Christians, as pledges of 
the favor of God, and passports to eternal hap- 
piness. Amid the triumph of these different 
errors, true moral excellence, the one and the 
only thing needful, has been regarded with 
about as much favor as a deposed monarch 



154 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

might expect from usurpers, who had seized 
upon and divided his kingdom. Make your- 
self acquainted with the true characters of 
many of those with whom one or another sys- 
tem of false religion has peopled heaven, and 
consider whether it be desirable that the num- 
ber of such men should be multiplied upon 
earth. Are we to expect any thing very much 
resembling the influence of true religion, from 
systems which hold up so false a standard of 
moral excellence'? If we are not, the experi- 
ment is yet to be made, which shall determine 
what that jniluence may be. 

It is the indissoluble union between the re- 
ligious opinions of men and their moral charac- 
ters, which renders the former a subject of such 
great interest. The controversies which exist 
respecting religious doctrines are not, as some 
seem to believe, mere disputes among theolo-^ 
gians, about speculative opinions and scholastic 
sub til ties ; they are a contest between truth 
and error, upon subjects of a practical impor- 
tance that cannot be estimated. They concern 
opinions, which lie at the very foundation of 
our hopes, our principles, our affections, our 
whole characters ; and which, as they are true 
or false, useful or pernicious, communicate their 
complexion and features to the whole aspect of 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 155 

society. They are controversies between truth 
and error respecting essential doctrines in the 
highest department of human knowledge. The 
present state of things is the result of the march 
of intellectual improvement, which, advancing 
rapidly elsewhere, has been stopped, and thrown 
back, by the prejudices that have intrenched 
themselves on religious ground. No one inter- 
ested in the well-being of his fellow-men is 
privileged to stand aloof, and look on with in- 
difference. There is a moral obligation upon 
every man, similar to that law which bound 
the citizens of Athens, in their civil divisions, 
to take part with the one side or the other. 
Those theologians who are engaged in defend- 
ing the truth, are engaged in maintaining the 
great cause of intellectual improvement, of good 
morals, of civil and religious freedom, of ra- 
tional piety, of human happiness, — of man- 
kind. They have a right to expect the aid of 
all who are interested in the same objects. 
They have a right to expect, that those who 
are employed in other intellectual pursuits, and 
other efforts to benefit their fellow-men, will 
not so separate and disconnect themselves, as 
they have sometimes done, through misappre- 
hension of the importance of the controversy, 
and through disgust at the style of reason- 



156 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

ing and modes of attack, which they must en- 
counter. 

Are you interested in advancing human 
knowledge, and can you think it a matter of 
indifference, whether men hold the grossest er- 
rors, or the sublimest truths concerning the 
very highest subjects of speculation *? You can 
hardly help feeling some degree of indignation 
and contempt toward those who condemned 
Galileo to the prisons of the Inquisition, for 
teaching the motion of the earth ; or toward 
the men who calumniated and persecuted Har- 
vey, because he made known the circulation of 
the blood. You respect the good sense and 
courage of those, by whom these truths were 
first maintained, in opposition to surrounding 
ignorance and prejudice. But nobody will 
think it too much to say, that these truths are 
not to be compared in importance with those 
which relate to the character and moral gov- 
ernment of God, and to the condition, duty, 
and destination of man. You are desirous of 
diffusing the blessings of instruction through 
the community, of carrying knowledge and 
light to the poor man's dwelling. Is there any 
knowledge which will be of such value to him 
as the knowledge of his duty and his hopes ; as 
that knowledge which will make him a good 



TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 157 

citizen, which will reconcile him to his situa- 
tion, and which may, at the same time, raise 
him to an essential equality with the most fa- 
vored of mankind'? You are interested, gener- 
ally, in the well-being of your fellow-men ; you 
are ready to afford your aid to those who would 
lessen the amount of abuses and oppressions, of 
crimes and miseries, which prey upon society ; 
you admire the intense energy of moral feeling 
which carried Howard, as a minister of good, 
wherever human wretchedness was to be found ; 
you know how to estimate the patient, untired, 
unyielding efforts of those who have almost 
succeeded in relieving the civilized world from 
the curse and the infamy of the slave-trade; 
you at least give your good wishes to those who 
would save mankind from the guilt and the 
horrors of war ; you are interested in every 
plan of enlightened benevolence ; — is it possi- 
ble, then, that you can be uninterested in assert- 
ing the character of those truths which are the 
support of all the social virtues, and without 
the belief of which, true, self-denying, persever- 
ing benevolence would find no dwelling-place 
on earth 1 The belief of these truths has 
formed the characters of that class of men in 
society, on which the good order and happiness 
of the community depend, and from which 

14 



158 TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION. 

alone you can look for safe auxiliaries in any 
endeavor to reform the evils which are in the 
world, and to improve the human condition. 
This belief alone can give birth to that disin- 
terested love of virtue, and of mankind, which 
pursues its object through good report and 
evil report, through opposition, and danger, 
and suffering ; and has pursued it even into the 
arms of death. It is this belief which creates 
the well-disposed citizen, the real patriot, and 
the enlightened and practical philosopher. If 
you doubt the value of true religion, look to 
experience, and look to human nature. If you 
do not doubt it, can you fail to give your aid to 
those who would vindicate its character and ex- 
tend its influence '? 



YIEWS OF CALYINISM 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE 



Shortly after the appearance of the preceding tract, 
the truth of the representation given in it of some of the doc- 
trines of Calvinism (see p. 107) was denied in a periodical 
work entitled the " Christian Spectator," published at New 
Haven. This denial led me to make a full statement of 
those doctrines in an article first published in the " Christian 
Disciple" for July and August, 1822. The substance of 
this article is contained in the tract which follows. I have 
omitted those portions which were only of temporary inter- 
est and immaterial to the main object in view, the giving of 
a correct account of Calvinism, and I have added a few re- 
marks at the end. For the most part, it is, as my purpose 
required, little more than a mere compilation. The obser- 
vation is perhaps unnecessary, that the system of doctrines 
about to be set forth has been called Calvinism, not because 
it had its origin with Calvin, but because he has been looked 
up to as its most conspicuous defender. 

Some readers may be disposed to ask why so shocking an 
exhibition should be made at the present day. No one now, 
they may say, or at least no considerable body of men, as- 
serts the truth of these doctrines. They may be inclined to 
turn away from their exhibition with some resentment that 
14* 



162 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

so painful a spectacle should be brought before them, and a 
vague feeling of incredulity as to the possibiHty that such 
doctrines have been believed. It is indeed an article not 
suited to every class of readers ; but to the student of human 
nature, to him who would know what men can believe and 
how they can feel, to him who recognizes the importance of 
the history of opinions, and especially of the history of hu- 
man errors respecting religion and Christianity, the phenom- 
enon that these doctrines have prevailed so widely among 
Protestants, and even extended into the Komish Church, — 
possessing the minds of such men as Pascal and the Port- 
Royahsts, — this phenomenon is one of the most instructive 
facts to which he can direct his attention. 

But it may still be objected, that such an exhibition is, at 
all events, not required for the removal of errors now exist- 
ing, — that these errors have become obsolete. A contro- 
versy (principally conducted by other hands) followed the 
publication of the " Views of Calvinism," and one of the 
last publications of the writer or writers in the " Christian 
Spectator " contained the following passage, in which the ob- 
jection just stated is implied : — 

" What Calvin believed and taught, and what any modern 
Calvinistic authors have taught, are questions of no real im- 
portance in the present discussion, any farther than their 
opinions are proved to be prevalent in our own times and in 
our own country. If therefore the Professor of Sacred Lit- 
erature in Cambridge University thinks it an object worthy 
his zeal and labor to collect and expose the opinions of oth- 
er centuries, or even the individual opinions of some in our 
own age, let him have the candour frankly to acquaint the 
public with his design." 

Before remarking on the objection I have mentioned, it 
may be observed incidentally, that in my statement, the truth 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 163 

of which was so confidently denied, and the truth of which, 
therefore, was not only of real importance in the discussion, 
but the sole point at issue, I said nothing about the ques- 
tion whether the doctrines alleged were prevalent in this 
country or not. I did not undertake to determine (for it was 
wholly aside from my purpose) whether all those who called 
themselves Calvinists were really Calvinists. 

Calvinism, it is contended, has undergone a change. It is 
not now the system of doctrines that was maintained by Cal- 
vin, and the Synod of Dort, and the Westminster Assembly, 
and which has made its way into the Articles of the Church 
of England and into the creeds of so many other Protestant 
sects. It may be said that it now exists, for the most part, 
in a qualified and mitigated form. But its original doctrines 
are still taught in the creeds of Protestant sects, as the char- 
acteristic doctrines of Christianity. If some belief resem- 
bling that expressed in those doctrines is to be received as 
true, and can be presented in a form less revolting to our 
reason and our moral sentiments, those creeds should be re- 
modelled, and the less offensive teaching, which is supposed 
to be true, should be substituted for the more offensive, 
which is acknowledged to be false. But the doctrines of 
Calvinism do not admit of being qualified or mitigated. All 
that can be done by way of removing their offence is to 
keep them out of view, and to present in popular discourses 
other doctrines, which may appear to be, but are not, incon- 
sistent with them. Take, for example, the Calvinistic doc- 
trine of reprobation, which teaches that a large portion of 
mankind are born into the world doomed by God to be 
wholly inclined to all moral evil, and to suffer everlasting 
misery. What is the veil which has been thrown over this 
doctrine to conceal its hideousness } It is this, — we are told 
that if we perish the fault is wholly our own ; that we can 



164 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

obey God's laws and save ourselves from misery if we will. 
But this is only a wretched concealment of the Calvinistic 
doctrine, a subterfuge which is disdainfully rejected by Cal- 
vin himself. It is simply a prevarication ; the assertion of 
a virtual falsehood in the guise of truth. The real truth of 
which it presents a false semblance is the very opposite of 
Calvinism. What Calvinism teaches is, that we are born 
with such natures that we cannot will to obey the laws of 
God. Yet the assertion that we can obey his laws if we 
will, it being understood that we cannot will to do so, is per- 
haps the most plausible piece of sophistry which has been 
brought forward in the attempt to exhibit Calvinism in a miti- 
gated form. 

In the existing state of things, when ignorance and mis- 
judgment concerning every thing connected with Christianity 
have spread so widely, and so much indifference to religious 
Truth exists, it is not improbable that many who call them- 
selves Calvinists have but a vague and fluctuating faith in 
their creed. I do not question that the same is true in re- 
gard to other great errors which have been represented as 
essential to our religion. No one can doubt that there are 
many who make a pubhc profession of belief in creeds 
which they do not believe. Their incredulity by no means 
diminishes the injury done to Christianity by those creeds to 
which they give their countenance, or palliates the wrong 
which they perpetrate against their fellow-men in misguid- 
ing them from the truth, or repelling them from it, by sub- 
stituting falsehood in its place. These professed believers 
are among the most culpable of the supporters of error. He 
who really believes even such a system as I am about to set 
forth, may think he has some justification or excuse in pro- 
pounding it to others. He may so deceive himself as thus 
to think ; — though, in fact, if the system were true, if the 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 165 

greater part of men, as it teaches, are born under a curse, 
foredoomed to eternal sin and eternal misery, it would be 
difficult to imagine what good might be hoped from its gen- 
eral, untempered reception. 

This system, however, is presented in the creeds of a very 
large portion of Protestants. It still operates on many 
minds, corrupting the faith of some and driving away others 
from our religion. It still has zealous and confident defend- 
ers. In lately turning over a number of a journal of some 
celebrity, " The North British Review," (that for February, 
1851,) I met with the following passage : — 

"We are bold to say, that Calvinism is the doctrine of the 
Established Churches of England and Scotland ; and if its 
tenets are an outrage to reason and derogatory to God, these 
Churches are no longer temples of truth, but synagogues of 
error. We venture also to declare it to be our own opinion, 
that Calvinism is the highest philosophy and the truest relig- 
ion. If it is not philosophy, man is without Reason : — If it 
is not religion, he is without Revelation." — p. 566. 

In another part of the same number, in complaining of 
what is called " an utter misrepresentation of Calvinism " 
by the author of " Alton Locke," this assertion is made : — 
" Calvinism is, when properly stated, the noblest formal and 
systematized expression that has ever been given to the 
world of those transcendent relations that bind man to the 
supernatural and the infinite." — p. 390, note. 

From the following article one may learn what that system 
is which is thus celebrated as " the highest philosophy and 
the truest religion," and judge how far it is capable of be- 
ing misrepresented to its prejudice. 



YIEWS OF CALYINISM. 



In the preceding tract, the following passage 
occurs : — 

"True religion is an inestimable blessing; because it 
teaches that God is the everlasting Friend and Father of 
his creatures, a God of infinite goodness. But what shall" 
we say of a religion which teaches that he has formed men 
so that they are by nature wholly inclined to all moral evil ; 
that he has determined in consequence to inflict upon the 
greater part of our race the most terrible punishments ; and 
that, unless he has seen fit to place us among the small num- 
ber of those whom he has chosen out of the common ruin, he 
will be our eternal enemy and infinite tormentor ; that, having 
hated us from our birth, he will continue to exercise upon us 
for ever his unrelenting and omnipotent hatred ! Whatever 
may be the worth of true religion, it surely does not follow, 
that this system of blasphemy must be also of great value, 
and very beneficial in its effects. Yet he must be a very ig- 
norant, or a very bold man, who will affirm, that the doctrines 
last stated have not been taught, and very extensively too, 
as fundamental doctrines of Christianity." 

As I have mentioned in the Introductory 



168 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

Note to the present article, the truth of this 
representation was denied in a periodical pub- 
lication of the day, — in which it was said : — 

" Did not the author know, when he penned this passage, 
that ' this system of blasphemy ' never was taught, or pro- 
fessed ' extensively, as fundamental doctrines of Christian- 
ity ' ? — that there never was a sect, or body of men, de- 
nominated Christian, who would not reject it as false and 
injurious, if presented to them as their creed ? — that there 
never was an individual author, of any celebrity or influence, 
who ever taught, or undertook to defend, such doctrines ? 
This, at least, he must have known, that neither ' the Insti- 
tutes of Calvin,' nor ' the works of the Westminster Assem- 
bly,' nor any of the Protestant Confessions of Faith, and, 
least of all, the confessions of those to whom he intended it 
should be applied, contain doctrines which are fairly repre- 
sented by any clause of the foregoing extract. How are 
we then astonished, when to this injurious representation the 
author has the effrontery to add — ' he must be a very ig- 
norant, or a very bold man, who will affirm, that the doc- 
trines last stated have not been taught, and very extensively 
too, as fundamental doctrines of Christianity.' The hold- 
ness, or the ignorance.) plainly belongs to the man who 
could bring such a charge against an extensive class of the 
Christian community — a charge which cannot be substan- 
tiated by fair quotations from any standard author, or any 
public confession of faith." 

The purpose of the following exposition is to 
shov/, that there is no misstatement of the doc- 
trines of Calvinism in the passage remarked 
upon. 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 169 

The propositions impliedly asserted in this 
passage to be doctrines of Calvinism are the 
following : — 

1. That God has formed men. 

2. That they are so formed, or, in other 
words, that God has so formed them, that they 
are by nature wholly inclined to all moral evil. 

3. That, in consequence of this nature, God 
inflicts on those who remain as they were thus 
formed to be, the most terrible punishments; 
that he will be their eternal enemy and infinite 
tormentor ; that, having hated them from their 
birth, he will continue to exercise upon them 
for ever his unrelenting and omnipotent hatred. 

4. That, though he has chosen some to be 
saved out of the common ruin, their number is 
comparatively small. 

In showing these to be doctrines of Calvin- 
ism I shall use but few authorities, but they 
will be authorities of the highest character. If 
the case required it, an indefinite number of 
others might be adduced. 

As to the first proposition, that God has 
formed men, or that God is our Creator, — that, 
whatever we are when we come into existence, 
he forms us such as we are, — I trust there will 
be no dispute. I suppose no one will deny it 

15 



170 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

to be a doctrine of Calvinism, that God is the 
Creator of men. 

The second proposition is, that, when formed 
or created by God, men are so formed that they 
are wholly inclined to all moral evil. 

So says the Westminster Assembly's Larger 
Catechism. 

" The Fall brought mankind into an estate of sin and mis- 
ery The sinfulness of that estate whereinto man 

fell, consisteth in the guilt of Adam's first sin, the want of that 
righteousness wherein he was created, and the corruption of 
his nature, whereby he is utterly indisposed, disabled, and 
made opposite unto all that is spiritually good, and wholly in- 
clined to all evil, and that continually ; which is commonly 
called Original Sin, and from which do proceed all actual 
transgressions." — Answers 23, 25. 

So says the Westminster Assembly's Confes- 
sion. 

" Man, by his fall into a state of sin, hath wholly lost all 
ability of will to any spiritual good accompanying salvation ; 
so as a natural man, being altogether averse from that good, 
and dead in sin, is not able, by his own strength, to convert 
himself, or to prepare himself thereunto." — Ch. IX. § 3. 

In these passages is described the present 
state of men, as they come into the world from 
the hands of their Creator. Nobody, I suppose, 
can be weak enough to imagine that the cir- 
cumstance, that the fall of Adam is assigned 
as the cause why men are in this state, affects 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 171 

the correctness of the account I have given of 
the state itself as here described. 

The following passage is from Calvin's 
" Short Formula of a Confession of Faith " : — 

" I confess that in Original Sin are comprehended blind- 
ness of mind and perversity of heart ; so that we are entire- 
ly despoiled and destitute of every thing connected with eter- 
nal life ; so that even our very natural faculties are all de- 
praved and contaminated. Whence it is that we are moved 
from within by no thought to do well. Wherefore I detest 
those who ascribe to us any freedom of will, bj'- which we 
may prepare ourselves to receive the grace of God ; or by 
which we may of ourselves cooperate with the Holy Spirit, 
which may be given us." — Tractatus Theologici. 0pp. 
VIII. 90, 91. Ed. Amst. 1667 - 71. 

The words immediately preceding this confes- 
sion are these : — 

" We are every one of us born infected with Original Sin, 
and from ourmother's womb are under the curse of God, 
and a sentence of damnation ; and this not on account of an- 
other's sin only, but on account of the wickedness which is 
within us even when it does not show itself." 

The following account of Original Sin was 
given by the famous Synod of Dort : — 

" All men are conceived in sin, and born children of 
wrath, without ability for any good tending to salvation, 
inclined to evil, dead in sins, and slaves of sin ; and, without 
the regenerating grace of the Holy Spirit, have neither 
will nor power to return to God^, to correct their depraved 



172 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

nature, or to dispose themselves to its correction." — Acta 
Synodi Dordrechti habitcE (Lugd. Batav. 1620), p. 256. 

The first article of their " Canons " of Chris- 
tian faith is this : — 

" As all men have sinned in Adam and become obnoxious 
to a curse and eternal death, God would have done injustice 
to no one, if he had willed to leave the whole human race 
in sin, and under a curse, and to damn them on account of 
sin ; — ac propter peccatum damnare.^"^ — Ibid. p. 241. 

The following is the account in the " Confes- 
sion of the Belgic Churches," finally approved 
and adopted by the Synod. 

" We believe that, by the disobedience of Adam, Original 
Sin was diifused through the whole race of man ; which 
is the corruption of the whole nature and an hereditary- 
depravity, by which even infants are polluted in their moth- 
er's womb, and from which as a root every kind of sin 
is produced in man ; and thus it is so vile and execrable in 
the sight of God, that it is sufficient for the condemnation 
of the human race." — Ibid. p. 305. 

President Edwards has the reputation of be- 
ing the most able expositor and defender of 
Calvinism in modern times. His views respect- 
ing the nature with which men are born appear 
in the following passages. 

" I now proceed to say, that mankind are all naturally in 
such a state, as is attended, without fail, with this conse- 
quence or issue, that they universally run themselves into 
that, which is, in effect, their own utter, eternal perdition, as 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 173 

being finally accursed of God, and the subjects of his rem- 
ediless wrath through sin." — On Original Sin. Works 
(Worcester ed., 1808-9), VI. 137. 

" If by flesh and spirit, when spoken of in the New Tes- 
tament, and opposed to each other, in discourses on the ne- 
cessaiy qualifications for salvation, we are to understand what 
has been now supposed, it will not only follow that men are 
corrupt by nature, but wholly corrupt^ without any good 
thing. If by flesh is meant man's nature, as he receives it 
in his first birth, then therein dicelleth no good thing ; as 
appears by Rom. vii. 18. It is wholly opposite to God and 
to subjection to his law ; as appears by Rom. viii. 7, 8. It 
is directly contrary to true holiness, and wholly opposes it, 
and holiness is opposite to that ; as appears by Gal. v. 17. 
So long as men are in their natural state, they not only have 
no good thing, but it is impossible they should have or do 
any good thing." — Ibid. p. 322. 

" So that, on the whole, there is sufficient reason to under- 
stand the Apostle, when he speaks of the natural man in 
that 1 Cor. ii. 14, as meaning man in his native, corrupt 
state. And his words represent him as totally corrupt, 
wholly a stranger and enemy to true virtue or holiness, and 
things appertaining to it, which it appears are commonly 
intended in the New Testament by things spiritual^ and 
are doubtless here meant by things of the Spirit of God. 
These words also represent that it is impossible man should 
be otherwise while in his natural state." — Ibid. p. 324. 

" If the Scriptures represent all mankind as wicked in 
their first state, before they are made partakers of the ben- 
efits of Christ's redemption, then they are wicked by nature ; 
for doubtless men's first state is their native state, or the 
state they come into the world in. But the Scriptures do 
thus represent all mankind." — Ibid. p. 325. 
15* 



174 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

" If it be so with all mankind, that as soon as ever they 
are capable of reflecting and knowing their own moral state, 
they find themselves wicked, this proves that they are wick- 
ed by nature ; either born wicked, or born with an infalli- 
ble disposition to be wicked as soon as possible, if there be 
any difference between these, and either of them will prove 
men to be born exceedingly depraved." — Ibid. pp. 325, 
326. 

It is unnecessary to adduce a larger number 
of passages to the present point, especially as 
most of those to be quoted under the heads 
which immediately follow bear directly upon it. 

The next proposition which is to be proved 
a doctrine of Calvinism is this : — That, in 
consequence of the nature which has been de- 
scribed as common to all men, God inflicts on 
those who retain the nature with which he 
formed them the most terrible punishments; 
that he will be their eternal enemy and infinite 
tormentor ; that, having hated them from their 
birth, he will continue to exercise upon them 
for ever his unrelenting and omnipotent hatred. 

This doctrine is thus stated by the Westmin- 
ster Divines in their Larger Catechism : — 

" The Fall brought upon mankind the loss of communion 
with God, his displeasure and curse, so as we are by nature 
children of wrath, bond-slaves to Satan, and justly liable 
to all punishments in this world, and that which is to come. 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 175 

" The punishments of sin in this world are either inward, 
as blindness of mind, a reprobate sense, strong delusions, 
hardness of heart, horror of conscience, and vile affections ; 
or outward, as the curse of God upon the creatures for our 
sakes, and all other evils that befall us in our bodies, 
names, estates, relations, and employments, together with 
death itself. 

" The punishments of sin in the world to come are 
everlasting separation from the comfortable presence of 
God, and most grievous torments in soul and body, without 
intermission, in hell-fire for ever." — Anss. 27- 29. 

To all these punishments we are, it is to be 
observed, justly liable for what we are by nature. 

Calvin, in the second book of his Institutes, 
Ch. I. § 8, defines Original Sin to be " the he- 
reditary depravity and corruption of our nature, 
extending to every part of the mind, which, in 
the first place, makes us justly liable to the 
wrath of God (quce primum facit reos irce 
Dei); and next produces those works in us, 
which the Scripture calls the works of the 
flesh." 

Whether Calvin was likely to shrink from 
the doctrine which I have stated, as too horrible 
to make a part of his system, may be judged 
from the following passage, where he is treat- 
ing of predestination. 

" With regard to those whom God created for contumely 
in life and for eternal death, that they might be vessels of 



176 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

his wrath, and examples of his severity ; he, in order that 
they may come to their appointed end, at one time deprives 
them of the power of hearing his word, and at another 
blinds and stupefies them the more by its preaching." — In- 
stitut. Lib. III. c. 24. § 12. 

Respecting the natural state of man, I will 
add a few more passages from Calvin. 

" By nature, we are heirs of eternal damnation, because 
the whole human race was cursed in Adam." — Adversus 
Franciscanum. Tractt. Theol. 0pp. VIII. 403. 

" We do not say, that any new nature was transmitted 
to us by Adam, but that God by a just judgment pronounced 
a curse upon us in Adam, and willed that we, on account 
of his sin, should be born in a state of corruption — Nov am 
ergo naturam nobis ah Adamo traditam esse non dicimus^ 
sed Deum justo judicio nohis in ipso maledixisse, ac volu- 
isse nos, ob illius peccatum^ corruptos nasci.'''' — Ibid. 
p. 405. 

" I acknowledge this to be my doctrine, that not merely 
by the permission of God, but by his secret counsel, 
Adam fell, and by his fall drew all his posterity into 

eternal ruin One fell, and all were brought 

under punishment ; nor this alone ; through the sin of one 
all receive contagion, and are born corrupted, and infected 
with a deadly taint. What, my good censor, do you say 
to this } Will you charge God with cruelty, because he 
cast down all his offspring to destruction through the fall 
of one man ? For though Adam ruined himself and his 
descendants, yet we must ascribe the 'corruption, and the 
state of guilt, in man, to the secret judgment of God ; for 
the sin of one man would have been nothing to us, if the 
heavenly judge had not condemned us to eternal destruc- 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 177 

tion." — Cdlumnice, Nehulonis et Calvini Respons., Art. I. 
Tractt. Theol 0pp. VIII. 634. 

" If any one attack us with such an inquiry as this, why 
God has from the beginning predestinated some men to 
death, who, not yet being brought into existence, could not 
deserve the sentence of death, we, by way of answer, will 
ask them * in return what they suppose God owes to man, 
if he chooses to judge him conformably to man's own na- 
ture. As we are all corrupted by sin, we must necessarily 
be odious to God, and that not from tyrannical cruelty, but 
according to the most equitable rules of justice. If all 
whom God predestinates to death are in their natural 
condition liable to the sentence of death, of what injustice 
to themselves, I pray, can they complain ? Let all the 
sons of Adam come forward ; let them contend and dis- 
pute with their Creator, because, by his eternal providence, 
they were, before their birth, adjudged to endless misery. 
What murmur will they be able to raise against this vindi- 
cation, when God on the other hand shall call them to a re- 
view of themselves ? If .they are all taken from a corrupt 
mass, it is no wonder if they all lie under a sentence of 
damnation. Let them not therefore accuse God of injus- 
tice, if by his eternal decree they are destined to death, to 
which they feel themselves led on by their own nature, of 
itself, whether they will or not — ad quam [mortem] a sua 
ipsorum naturd sponte se perduci, velint nolint, ipsi senti- 
unty — Institut. Lib. III. c. 23. § 3. 

The purpose of the third of Edwards's " Fif- 
teen Sermons " is to prove, that men are iiatu- 
rally God's enemies^ which words are the title 

* So in the original. 



178 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

of the sermon. His third inference is : " From 
this doctrine you may learn how dreadful the 
condition of natural man is"; that is, how 
dreadful the condition of men is as created by 
God; they are by their very nature sinners, 
enemies of God, children of wrath, and justly 
liable to infinite, inconceivable torments. 

In his sermon entitled, " Sinners in the 
Hands of an angry God," he says : — 

" So that thus it is, that natural men are held in the 
hand of God over the pit of hell ; they have deserved the 
fiery pit, and are already sentenced to it; and God is 
dreadfully provoked, his anger is as great toward them 
as to those that are actually suffering the executions of the 
fierceness of his wrath in hell ; the devil is wait- 
ing for them, hell is gaping for them, the flames gather 
and flash about them, and would fain lay hold on them and 
swallow them up." — Works, VII. 493. 

Again, from the same sermon : — 

" They are now the objects of that very same anger and 
wrath of God, that is expressed in the torments of hell : 
and the reason why they do not go down to hell at each 
moment is not because God, in whose power they are, is 
not then very angry with them ; as angry as he is with 
many of those miserable creatures that he is now torment- 
ing in hell, and do there feel and bear the fierceness of his 
wrath." — Ihid. p. 489. 

The following words from the same dis- 
course are addressed to all the unregenerate, — 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 179 

to all those who retain the nature given them 
by God at their birth, not having been born 
again, in the Calvinistic use of that phrase. 

" The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as 
one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect, over the fire, 
abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked ; his wrath towards 
you burns like fire ; he looks upon you as worthy of noth- 
ing else but to be cast into the fire ; he is of purer eyes 
than to bear to have you in his sight ; you are ten thousand 
times so abominable in his eyes, as the most hateful and 
venomous serpent is in ours." — Ihid. p. 496. 

The doctrine that all human beings are 
brought into existence with natures which 
make them proper objects of divine vengeance, 
when it is extended to such as during their 
being here have manifestly had no power of 
doing good or avoiding evil, — that is to say, 
when extended to infants, — becomes, though 
in no respect more repugnant to reason, yet so 
shocking to the feelings, that some who have 
received the doctrine in the gross have shrunk 
from this application of it. But on this sub- 
ject, as might be supposed, Calvin was consist- 
ent. He says : — 

"Even infants bring their damnation with them from 
their mother's womb ; for although they have not yet pro- 
duced the fruits of their iniquity, they have the seed of it 
inclosed within them. Nay, their whole nature is, as it 



180 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

were, a seed of sin; so that it cannot be otherwise than 
odious and abominable to God." — Institut. Lib. IV. c. 15. 
^ 10 ; conf. Lib. II. c. 1. % 8. 

In one place he indignantly disavows the 
opposite opinion. 

" As if I denied that the whole race of Adam is, by 
nature, under a curse, so that even infants before being 
born to light are liable to eternal death." — Append. Lib. 
de vera Eccles. reform. Ratione. Tractt. Theol. 0pp. 

vm. 301. 

In his tract " On the Hidden Providence of 
God," in answer to Castalio, he says : — 

" You deny that it is lawful for God to damn any one 
unless for actual transgression. Innumerable infants are 
taken from life. Put forth now your virulence against God, 
who plunges into eternal death harmless infants {innoxios 
fcetus) torn from their mothers' breasts. He who will not 
detest this blasphemy [the blasphemy of Castalio in deny- 
ing it to be lawful for God so to deal with infants] may re- 
vile me at his pleasure. For it cannot be demanded that I 
should be safe and free from the railings of those who do not 
spare God." — Tractt. Theol 0pp. VIII. 644. 

The scheme which Calvin maintained, and 
to which his name has been given, was essen- 
tially coincident with that of his predecessor 
Luther. The following passage is from Lu- 
ther's treatise " On the Servitude of the Will " 
fDe servo Arhitrio). 

" If any one should object, that it is difficult to defend 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 181 

the mercy and justice of God, inasmuch as he condemns 
the undeserving (immeritos), that is, those who are impi- 
ous only because they are born in impiety, and have no 
power, in any way, to do any thing to save themselves from 
remaining impious and being condemned, but are forced by 
a necessity of nature to sin and perish, conformably to 
what Paul says : ' We were all children of wrath like oth- 
ers,' — seeing that they were created such by God himself 
from seed corrupted by the sin of one man, Adam ; — I an- 
swer, That we must honor and reverence the great mercy 
of God toward those whom he justifies and saves, though 
most unworthy ; and that we must defer something at least 
to the divine wisdom, so as to believe God just, when he 
may appear to us unjust. For if his justice were such that 
human apprehension might perceive it to be just, it plainly 
would not be divine, and would differ in nothing from hu- 
man justice." — 0pp. II. fol. 485, vo. Witebergse, 1562. 

Dr. Twiss was one of the most eminent Cal- 
vinists of his day, the Prolocutor of the West- 
minster Assembly. In his " Vindication of the 
Grace, Power, and Providence of God," he puts 
forward and defends this aspect of the Calvin- 
istic doctrine. In one passage he says : — 

" The sin of Adam, I confess, was not ours as perpetrat- 
ed by us in our proper persons ; but was rather the sin of 
our nature than of our persons. But we existed even then 
in the loins of Adam, as Levi did in those of Abraham, when 
the latter paid tithes to Melchisedec ; and his sin is made 
ours by the imputation of God ; so that it has exposed in- 
numerable infants to Divine wrath, who were guilty of this 
sin, and of no other." — Lib. IIL p. 21. Ed. 2da. 4to. 
Amst. 1632. 

16 



182 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

This being but a particular application of a 
general doctrine, we may not expect to find it 
specifically stated in Calvinistic creeds and 
catechisms. In the Westminster Assembly's 
Confession (Ch. X.) elect infants are spoken of 
in contradistinction from others; which im- 
plies that there are others who are reprobate. 
But in works intended for the use of the un- 
learned, the wretched condition of infants has 
been often brought into view, apparently with 
the purpose of producing a more awful impres- 
sion on the mind of the reader. Thus, in what 
was one of the most popular books of the kind, 
Boston's " Human Nature in its Fourfold State," 
the author says : — 

'* Surely we are not born innocent. These chains of 
wrath, which by nature are upon us, speak us to be born 
criminals. The swaddling-bands wherewith infants are 
bound hand and foot, as soon as they are born, may put us 
in mind of the cords of wrath with which they are held pris- 
oners as children of wrath." — p. 122. Ed. 13th. 1763. 

Concerning the case of these reprobates, sin- 
ners before being moral agents, some Calvinists 
have been inclined to think that their future 
condition would not be worse than non-exist- 
ence. But this supposition, says Edwards, 

"-to me appears plainly a giving up that grand point of 
the imputation of Adam's sin, both in whole and in part. 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 183 

For it supposes it to be not right for God to bring any evil 
on a child of Adam, which is innocent as to personal sin, 
without paying for it, or balancing it with good ; so that still 
the state of the child shall be as good as could be demanded 
in justice in case of mere innocence. Which plainly sup- 
poses that the child is not exposed to any proper punish- 
ment at all, or is not at all in debt to divine justice on the 

account of Adam's sin 

"It seems to me pretty manifest that none can, in good 
consistence with themselves, own a real imputation of the 
guilt of Adam's first sin to his posterity, without owning that 
they are justly viewed and treated as sinners, truly guilty 
and children of wrath on that account ; nor unless they al- 
low a just imputation of the whole of the evil of that trans- 
gression ; at least, all that pertains to the essence of that act, 
as a full and complete violation of the covenant which God 
had established ; even as much as if each one of mankind 
had the like covenant established with him singly, and had 
by the like direct and full act of rebellion violated it for him- 
self."— 0?z Original Sin. Works, VI. 462, 463. 

If, indeed, God do create men with a nature 
which necessarily makes them objects of his 
vengeance, and for the purpose of exercising 
this vengeance upon them, it is of no conse- 
quence whether the interval between their cre- 
ation and their sufferings be longer or shorter, 
— whether he keep them in this world an hour 
or a century. If, as moral agents, they can do 
nothing to deliver themselves from his curse, it 
is of no consequence whether those on whom 
his curse is inflicted are what may be called 



184 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

moral agents or not. If he form men with 
moral natures wholly inclined to all evil, under 
an absolute decree of reprobation, he might, in 
equal consistency with justice, form them with 
such natures and place them in hell at once. 

In many of the preceding passages there is a 
reference to Adam, as having some agency in 
causing all mankind to be brought into the 
world with such natures as have been described. 
He has been interposed to shield the Creator 
from any imputation of injustice or cruelty. 

" If any one," says Calvin, " will dispute with God, and 
attempt to evade his judgment by this pretext, that he could 
not have acted otherwise than he has done, God has this an- 
swer ready, which we have elsewhere adduced, that it arises 
not from the creation, but from the corruption of human 
nature, that men being enslaved to sin can will nothing but 
what is evil. For whence proceeds that impotence, which 
the wicked are so ready to bring forward as a pretext, but 
from this, that Adam voluntarily devoted himself to the ser- 
vice of the Devil ? Hence that corruption by whose chains 
we are held bound ; because the first man revolted from his 
Maker. If all men are justly regarded as guilty of this re- 
volt, let them not think themselves excused by necessity." 
— Institut. Lib. II. c. 5. ^ 1. 

The Calvinistic doctrine concerning the na- 
ture of the connection between Adam's sin and 
the guilt and misery of mankind is not well set- 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 185 

tied. Perhaps the most common account of it 
is this : — Adam is represented as the " federal 
head " (to borrow a term from the language of 
the system) of the whole human race, consid- 
ered collectively. With him, it is taught, God 
entered into a covenant, the terrible penalties 
for the breach of which were, through him as a 
" public person," incurred equally by all his de- 
scendants as by himself Thus it is said in the 
Westminster Assembly's Larger Catechism : — 

" The covenant being made with Adam as a public per- 
son, not for himself only, but for his posterity, all mankind 
descending from him by ordinary generation sinned in him, 
and fell with him in that first transgression." — Ans. 22. 

Other Calvinists have given different views, 
as, for example. Dr. Twiss, in the passage quot- 
ed from him on p. 181 ; and Calvin himself, in 
the passages quoted on p. 176, in one of which 
he says, " The sin of one man would have been 
nothing to us, if the Heavenly Judge had not 
condemned us to eternal destruction." 

In the Articles of the Church of England, 
nothing is affirmed, except negatively, concern- 
ing the relation between the sin of Adam and 
the ruin of mankind. The ninth Article, " On 
Original Sin," teaches as follows : — 

" Original Sin standeth not in the following of Adam (as 
the Pelagians do vainly talk), but it is the fault or corrup- 
16* 



186 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

tion of the nature of every man that naturally is engendered 
of the offspring of Adam, whereby man is very far gone 
from original righteousness, and is of his own nature in- 
clined to evil, so that the Flesh lusteth always contrary to 
the Spirit, and, therefore, in every person born into the 
world it deserveth God's wrath and damnation." 

As there can be no guilt in being born, it fol- 
lows that this guilt is contracted by every per- 
son before his birth. It is implied that it is in 
some way connected with Adam, but in what 
manner it is so connected is not explained. 
The birth of a man is commonly regarded as 
the commencement of his existence, at least of 
his existence as a moral being ; but, notwith- 
standing this, the only partial solution of the 
problem seems to be that before quoted from 
Dr. Twiss, that when Adam sinned, " we exist- 
ed even then in his loins, as Levi did in those 
of Abraham, when the latter paid tithes to Mel- 
chisedec." To complete this solution we must 
add another idea, — that we existed and were 
consenting to his sin. 

Perhaps Calvin has nowhere explained his 
views on this subject more fully than in his 
Commentary on Ephesians ii. 3. The words 
of the text, as they stand in our Common Ver- 
sion, it will be recollected, are these: — "We 
were by nature the children of wrath, even as 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 187 

others." * Upon this text Calvin observes, that 
by " children of wrath " is meant nothing else 
than " ruined, worthy of eternal death " ; that it 
is equivalent to " condemned before God," co- 
ram Deo damnati. It is a remarkable passage, 
he says, against the Pelagians. " Paul bears 
testimony that we are born with sin, as serpents 
bring their poison with them from the womb." 
"Where there is condemnation, there must of 
necessity be sin, because God is angry, not with 
innocent men, but with sin." Upon this, he 
says, a question may arise : " How, seeing that 
God is the author of nature, he can be without 
blame, if we are ruined by nature ] " "I an- 
swer," he says, " that there are two kinds of 
nature ; the first was originally made by God, 
the second is the corruption of the former. 
The condemnation, therefore, of which Paul 
speaks, by no means flows from God, but from 

* The proper meaning of these words I conceive to be this : — 
" We were by nature as much exposed to punishment as the rest 
of men " ; that is, we Jewish Christians (of whom St. Paul is here 
speaking, in contradistinction from the Gentile converts whom he is 
addressing) had no peculiar claim to the favor of God, on account 
of our natural descent from Abraham and the other patriarchs. 
That the Jews believed they had a special right to the favor of 
God, merely on this ground, appears from the Scriptures, the Rab- 
binical writings, and other sources of evidence. This opinion is 
alluded to by John the Baptist, when he says, " Think not to 
say to yourselves, We have Abraham for our father," 



188 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

a depraved nature, because we are not now 
born as Adam was created in the beginning, 
but are an adulterate seed from a degenerate 
and corrupt man." 

The reasoning of Calvin appears to be this : 
— God created Adam with a nature very differ- 
ent from ours ; but Adam committed a great 
sin, and therefore it is just in God to bring us 
into the world with natures that necessarily 
make us objects of his vengeance. The incon- 
sequence of this conclusion is rendered a little 
more glaring when viewed in connection with an- 
other doctrine, — that the fall of Adam, so called, 
with all its supposed results, was foreordained 
by God and the necessary effect of his will. 

On the doctrine just referred to, the doctrine 
of " God's Decrees," as it is called, the whole 
system of Calvinism rests. It teaches that the 
character and condition of men are determined 
in this life, and through eternity, by the abso- 
lute decrees of God, irrespectively of any thing 
they can do for themselves. Thus, " according 
to his sovereign power and the unsearchable 
counsel of his own will," he has determined 
that the reprobate should be born with sinful 
natures, that they should for ever be sinners, 
and consequently eternal objects of his ven- 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 189 

geance. This doctrine annihilates at once all 
those evasions of the truth, those imagined me- 
liorations of the system, which have been sup- 
posed capable of reconciling it with our reason, 
if not with our moral feelings. 

The character of the doctrine appears in the 
following passages. 

" All things," says Calvin, " being at God's disposal, and 
the decision of salvation or death belonging to him, he or- 
ders all things by his counsel and decree in such a manner, 
that some men are born devoted from the womb to certain 
death ; that his name may be glorified in their destruction. 
If any one should pretend, that no necessity is imposed up- 
on them by the foreknowledge of God, but rather that such 
is the condition under which they have been created, in con- 
sequence of his foreknowledge of their future depravity, 
he will say what is partly true, but not the whole truth. 

If God merely foresaw the fates of men, and did 

not also dispose and fix them by his determination, there 
would be room to agitate the question, whether his foresight 
rendered them at all necessary. But, since he foresees 
future events only in consequence of his decree that they 
shall take place, it is useless to dispute about the proper 
inference from foreknowledge, while it is certain that all 
things come to pass by ordination and decree." — Institut. 
Lib. III. c. 23. § 6. 

In answer to those who say " that it is no- 
where declared in express terms that God 
decreed that Adam should perish by his defec- 
tion," Calvin replies, in the next section to that 
just quoted : — 



190 VIEWS OF CALVINISM, 

" But predestination, whether they will or not, shows 
itself in his posterity. For it was not a natural conse- 
quence (neque eniin factum est naturdliter) that all men 
should lose salvation through the guilt of their first parent. 
What then prevents them from confessing that to be true in 
relation to one man, which they reluctantly concede in re- 
lation to all the rest of mankind ? Why should they waste 
time in sophistical evasions } The Scripture proclaims, 
that all men were, in the person of one, given over to eter- 
nal death. As this cannot be regarded as a natural conse- 
quence [hoc quum naturce ascrihi nequeat), it is evident 
that it must have been the result of the wonderful counsel 
of God. That these pious defenders of the justice of God 
should stick at trifles, while they leap over great difficulties, 
is too absurd. Again, I ask, How has it come to pass, that 
the fall of Adam has involved so many nations with their 
infant children in eternal death without remedy, but be- 
cause such was the will of God ? It is a dreadful de- 
cree, I confess." 

Decretum quidem horrihile, fateor. Calvin 
was not given to human relentings, and the 
words are worth preserving as a matter of cu- 
riosity. 

" The reprobate," says Calvin, " would be thought excus- 
able in sinning, because they cannot avoid the necessity 
of sinning, especially as this necessity is imposed upon 
them by the ordinance of God. But we deny this to be a 
just excuse ; since the ordinance of God, by which they 
complain that they are destined to destruction, is conforma- 
ble to equity, unknown indeed to us, but indubitably cer- 
tain."— /W. § 9. 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 191 

I have observed in the Introductory Note, 
that Calvin regarded with contempt the subter- 
fuge which has been resorted to by some of his 
followers in saying, that " every one may be 
saved if he will," that "men transgress and suf- 
fer only of their free choice " ; — it being main- 
tained at the same time, that " man by his fall 
hath wholly lost all ability of will to any spirit- 
ual good accompanying salvation " ; or, as the 
Church of England expresses it, that " the con- 
dition of man after the fall of Adam is such 
that he cannot turn and prepare himself by his 
own natural strength and good works to faith 
and calling upon God." The object of Calvin 
in the second chapter of the second book of 
his Institutes, as stated in its title, is, to prove 
that " man in his present state is despoiled of 
freedom of will, and subjected to a miserable 
slavery." . He quotes and opposes the opinions 
of different writers, who thought that freedom 
of w^ill might in one sense or another be as- 
cribed to man, and finally mentions that of Pe- 
ter Lombard. Lombard, he says, " decides that 
our will is free, not because we are equally able 
to do or to think what is good or what is evil ; 
but only because we are free from compulsion 
{coactione soluti sumiis); which liberty may 
exist, notwithstanding we are corrupted, and 



192 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

are slaves of sin, and can do nothing but sin." 
Upon which. Calvin remarks : — 

" According to this, man will be said to possess freedom 
of will, not because he has a free choice equally of good 
and evil, but because he does evil conformably to his will 
and not by compulsion. This is very true ; but what pur- 
pose was to be answered by giving so proud a title to a 
thing of so little importance ? An admirable kind of lib- 
erty indeed, if man be under no compulsion to serve sin, 
but is yet such a willing slave, that his will is held bound 
by the fetters of sin. I abominate disputes about words, by 
which the Church is disturbed without any good result ; but 
I think we ought religiously to avoid those words which ap- 
pear to express an absurdity ; especially on a subject re- 
specting which there are pernicious errors. For how many 
are there, I pray, who, when they hear freedom of will as- 
cribed to man, do not immediately conceive of him as 
master of his own mind and will, so as to be able of himself 
to turn to either side [either good or evil] ? But it may 
be said that this danger will be removed, if the common 
people are carefully informed of the sense in which the 
term is used. This is not true ; the human mind is of it- 
self so prone to false opinions, that it will more readily im- 
bibe error from a single word, than truth from a long dis- 
course." — § 7. 

Such was the opinion of Calvin concerning 
that abuse of language which has been resorted 
to ; and so far was he from asserting, that men 
" transgress and suffer only of their free choice." 

I return to the subject of the Divine Decrees. 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 193 

In the Westminster Assembly's Larger Cate- 
chism, the doctrine concerning them is thus 
stated : — 

" God's decrees are the wise, free, and holy acts of the 
counsel of his will ; whereby, from all eternity, he hath, for 
his own glory, unchangeably foreordained whatsoever comes 
to pass in time ; especially concerning angels and men. 

" God, by an eternal and immutable decree, out of his 
mere love, for the praise of his glorious grace, to be mani- 
fested in due time, hath elected some angels to glory, and 
in Christ hath chosen some men to eternal life, and the 
means thereof ; and also, according to his sovereign power 
and the unsearchable counsel of his own will (whereby he 
extendeth or withholdeth favor as he pleaseth), hath passed 
by, and foreordained the rest to dishonor and wrath, to be 
for their sin inflicted, to the praise of the glory of his jus- 
tice." — Anss. 12, 13. 

The following is from Edwards's " Miscella- 
neous Observations concerning the Divine De- 
crees and Election " : — 

" God decrees all things, and even all sins God 

determines the limits of men's lives If the limits of 

men's lives are determined, men's free actions must be de- 
termined, and even their sins ; for their lives often depend 
on such acts." — Works, V. 378, 379. 

The purpose of God in creation, and in his 
decrees respecting his creatures, is thus ex- 
plained by Edwards : — • 

"The moral rectitude and fitness of the disposition, in- 
17 



194 A^EWS OF CALVINISM, 

clination, or aflfection of God's heart, does chiefly consist in 
a respect or regard to himself, infinitely above his regard to 
all other beings ; or, in other words, his holiness consists in 
this. 

" And if it be thus fit that God should have a supreme 
regard to himself, then it is fit that this supreme regard 
should appear in those things by which he makes himself 
known, or by his word and works ; i. e. in what he says, 
and in what he does. If it be an infinitely amiable thing in 
God that he should have a supreme regard to himself, then 
it is an aniiable thing that he should act as having a chief 
regard to himself." — Concerning the End for which God 
created the World. Works, VI. 23, 24. 

Accordingly, Edwards undertakes to prove, 
that " God manifests a supreme and ultimate 
regard to himself in all his works " ; that " God's 
glory is an ultimate end of the creation " ; and 
that " God created the world for his name, to 
make his perfections known, and that he made 
it for his praise." — Ibid, pp. 34, 68, 87. 

It is not here explained how God's " supreme 
regard to himself" operates to produce the de- 
cree of reprobation. The explanation is else- 
where given by Edwards. This decree is at 
once " to glorify his justice " and to show forth 
" his mighty power " as manifested in inflicting 
vengeance on the unconverted. In his Sermon 
entitled " Sinners in the Hands of an Angry 
God " he says, addressing the unconverted : — 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 195 

" The misery you are exposed to is that which God will 
inflict to that end, that he might show what that wrath of 
Jehovah is. God hath had it on his heart to show to angels 
and men, both how excellent his love is, and also how terri- 
ble his wrath is. Sometimes earthly kings have a mind to 
show how terrible their wrath is, by the extreme punish- 
ments they would execute on those that provoke them. 
Nebuchadnezzar, that mighty and haughty monarch of the 
Chaldean empire, was willing to show his wrath when en- 
raged with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego ; and accord- 
ingly gave order that the burning fiery furnace should be 
heated seven times hotter than it was before ; doubtless, it 
was raised to the utmost degree of fierceness that human art 
could raise it ; but the great God is also willing to show his 
wrath, and magnify his awful majesty and mighty power in 

the extreme sufferings of his enemies And seeing 

this is his design, and what he has determined, to show how 
terrible the unmixed, unrestrained wrath, the fury, and 
fierceness of Jehovah is, he will do it to effect. There will 
be something accomplished and brought to pass that will be 
dreadful with a witness. When the great and angry God 
hath risen up and executed his awful vengeance on the poor 
sinner, and the wretch is actually suffering the infinite 
weight and power of his indignation, then will God call upon 
the whole universe to behold that awful majesty and mighty 
power that is to be seen in it 

" Thus it will be with you that are in an unconverted 
state, if you continue in it ; the infinite might, and majesty, 
and terribleness of the Omnipotent God shall be magnified 
upon you, in the ineffable strength of your torments : you 
shall be tormented in the presence of the holy angels, and 
in the presence of the Lamb ; and when you shall be in this 
state of suffering, the glorious inhabitants of heaven shall go 



196 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

forth and look on the awful spectacle, that they may see 
what the wrath and fierceness of the Almighty is ; and 
when they have seen it, they will fall down and adore that 
great power and majesty." — Works, VII. 499-501. 

Thus, also, according to the Westminster 
Assembly, the reprobate, that is, far the greater 
part of mankind, are ordained to sin and to 
suffer eternal torments, " for the glory of God's 
sovereign power over his creatures," and " to 
the praise of his glorious justice." 

" The rest of mankind [with the exception of the elect] 
God was pleased, according to the unsearchable counsel of 
his own will, whereby he extendeth or withholdeth mercy, 
as he pleaseth, for the glory of his sovereign power over his 
creatures, to pass by, and to ordain them to dishonor and 
wrath for their sin, to the praise of his glorious justice." — 
Westminster Assembly''s Confession. Ch. III. ^ 7. 

No explanation is given either by the West- 
minster Assembly or by Edwards of the manner 
in which the decree of reprobation redounds to 
the praise of the Divine justice. Some Calvin- 
istic writers, not contending for so much as this, 
have only maintained that the decree is recon- 
cilable with any idea that we ought to form of 
justice as ascribed to God. 

Thus Dr. Twiss, in his work before quoted, 
speaking of the reprobation of infants, ob- 
serves : — 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 197 

" These judgments of God are tremendous, I confess, but 
just ; nor are they to be brought before the tribunal of hu- 
man wisdom and justice, or examined and discussed by 
the rules of our reason and equity. Especially as it is law- 
ful for God the Creator to treat a creature, however inno- 
cent (quantumvis immerentem), in whatever manner he 
pleases, whether it seem good to God to annihilate him, or 
to inflict upon him any torture whatever." — Lib. III. p. 21. 

In his second book he has a digression to 
prove that " God may afflict or torment an in- 
nocent creature at pleasure " : — Prohatur posse 
Deum creaturam immerentem affligere^ sen pro 
libito cruciare. In maintaining this proposi- 
tion, he affirms that 

" There is no such thing in God as justice, properly so 
called, in respect to his creatures, that is to say, by which 
he is bound in respect to them." 

" I acknowledge," he says, " no other justice in God, 
than that by which he wisely orders all things to effect his 
own purposes." — Lib. II. pp. 15, 16. 

The same doctrine was maintained by the 
learned Theophilus Gale, the author of a book 
once famous, " The Court of the Gentiles," in 
which he says : — 

" So great is the Majestic of God, and so Absolute his Do- 
minion, as that he is obnoxious to no Laws, Obligations, or 
Ties from his Creature : this Absolute Justice or Dominion 
regards not any qualities or conditions of its object ; but 
God can by virtue hereof inflict the highest torments on his 
17* 



198 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

innocent creature, and exempt from punishment the most 
nocent. By this Absolute Justice and Dominion God can 
inflict the greatest torments, even of Hel it self, on the most 
innocent creature." — Part IV. p. 367. 

The unspeakable misery which the justice of 
God may inflict on the most innocent creature, 
and which he is supposed to inflict on those 
who have never oifended against him except 
through an inevitable necessity imposed by 
himself, consists, as we have seen, according to 
the Westminster Assembly, in " most grievous 
torments in soul and body, without intermission, 
in hell-fire for ever." On this subject the im- 
agination of Edwards runs riot. In his Ser- 
mon entitled " Men naturally God's Enemies," 
is the following address, — utterly illogical, as 
men can do nothing to help themselves, and 
one which, if it were not clear that the writer 
had obstinately shut his eyes to this fundamen- 
tal article of his faith, would be savagely in- 
sulting. 

" If you continue God's enemy until death, you will al- 
ways be his enemy. And after death your enmity will have 
no restraint, but it will break out, and rage without control. 
When you come to be a firebrand of hell, you will be a fire- 
brand in two respects ; viz. as you will be all on fire, full 
of the fire of God's wrath : and also as you will be all on 
a blaze with spite and malice towards God. You will be as 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 199 

full of the fire of malice, as you will with the fire of Divine 
vengeance ; and both will make you full of torment. Then 
you will appear as you are, a viper indeed. You are now 
a viper, but under great disguise ; a wolf in sheep's cloth- 
ing; but then your mask will be pulled off; you shall lose 
your garments and walk naked. Rev. xvi. 15. Then will 
you as a serpent spit poison at God, and vent your rage and 
malice in fearful blasphemies. Out of that mouth, out of 
which, when you open it, will proceed flames, will also pro- 
ceed dreadful blasphemies against God. That same tongue, 
to cool which you will wish for a drop of water, will be eter- 
nally employed in cursing and blaspheming God and Christ." 
— Works.yil. 198. 

I will venture to quote a few more sentences, 
relating to the same subject, from another pas- 
sage of Edwards. I quote them, however, prin- 
cipally for the purpose of still further showing 
what conceptions Calvinism teaches men to 
form of God. The passage referred to is in his 
Sermon entitled " Sinners in the Hands of an 
Angry God." 

" The wrath of kings is very much dreaded, especially of 
absolute monarchs, that have the possessions and lives of 
their subjects wholly in their power, to be disposed of at 
their mere will The subject that very much en- 
rages an arbitrary prince is liable to suffer the most ex- 
treme torments that human art can invent, or human power 

can inflict The wrath of the great King of kings 

is as much more terrible than theirs, as his majesty is 
greater 

" It is the fierceness of his wrath that you are exposed to. 



200 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

We often read of the fury of God ; as in Isaiah lix. 17. 

So we read of God's fierceness. Rev. xix. 15. 

There we read of ' the wine-press of the fierceness and 
wrath of Almighty God.' The words are exceedingly ter- 
rible. If it had only been said, ' the wrath of God,' the 
words would have implied that which is infinitely dreadful : 
but it is not only said so, but ' the fierceness and wrath of 
God.' The fury of God ! the fierceness of Jehovah ! O, 
how dreadful must that be ! Who can utter or conceive 
what such expressions carry in them ! But it is not only 
said so, but ' the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.' 
As though there would be a very great manifestation of his 
almighty power in what the fierceness of his wrath should 
inflict, as though omnipotence should be as it were enraged, 
and exerted as men were wont to exert their strength in the 

fierceness of their wrath 

*' How awful are those words, Isaiah Ixiii. 3, which are 
the words of the great God. ' I will tread them in mine an- 
ger, and trample them in my fury, and their blood shall be 
sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my rai- 
ment.' It is perhaps impossible to conceive of words that 
carry in them greater manifestations of these three things, 
viz. contempt, and hatred, and fierceness of indignation. 
If you cry to God to pity you, he will be so far from pitying 
you in your doleful case, or showing you the least regard or 
favor, that, instead of that, he will only tread you under foot : 
and though he will know that you cannot bear the weight 
of omnipotence treading upon you, yet he will not regard 
that, but he will crush you under his feet without mercy ; 
he will crush out your blood, and make it fly, and it shall be 
sprinkled on his garments, so as to stain all his raiment. 
He will not only hate you, but he will have you in the ut- 
most contempt ; no place shall be thought fit for you, but 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 201 

under his feet to be trodden down as the mire of the 
streets." ^ Works, VII. 497-499. 

Such is the inconsistence often found in 
men's characters, that, perhaps, one would not 
be justified in inferring from the passages I have 
quoted from Edwards, that he was wholly des- 
titute of right conceptions of God, of proper 
affections towards Him, and of commiseration 
for the sufferings of his fellow-creatures. In 
respect to such commiseration, however, it 
could not be reasonably felt, in accordance with 
the scheme of religion which he adopted and 
defended. The vast amount of misery on which 
he expatiates as about to be inflicted on his 
fellow-men was, conformably to that scheme, 
only a manifestation of the " infinite amiable- 
ness" of God in "his supreme regard to him- 
self." * To look on such a manifestation with 
horror would be in a high degree sinful. For 
one of the chosen to regard it with any feeling 
but satisfaction, can be only the result of some 
remaining weakness of the natural man. It is 
taught by Edwards, in common with many 
other Calvinistic writers, that, in that holier 
state to which " the saints " are advancing, the 
sight of the tortures which he describes will be 

* See before, p. 194. 



202 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

a subject of self-gratulation, exalting their hap- 
piness, and giving them a new sense of God's 
goodness. The main purpose in the infliction 
of these tortures on the subjects of the decree of 
reprobation is represented to be, " that the 
name of God may be glorified in their destruc- 
tion." But besides this there is another pur- 
pose, which is thus explained by Edwards : — 

" The sight of hell torments will exalt the happiness of 
the saints for ever. It will not only make them more sensi- 
ble of the greatness and freeness of the grace of God in 
their happiness ; but it will really make their happiness the 
greater, as it will make them more sensible of their own 
happiness ; it will give them a more lively relish of it ; it 
will make them prize it more. When they see others, who 
were of the same nature, and born under the same circum- 
stances, plunged in such misery, and they so distinguished, 
O, it will make them sensible how happy they are. A sense 
of the opposite misery, in all cases, greatly increases the 
relish of any joy or pleasure." — Sermon on the Eternity 
of Hell Torments. Works, VII. 415. 

To finish the exposition proposed of the doc- 
trines of Calvinism, it only remains to show 
that it teaches " that the number of those 
saved out of the common ruin of mankind is 
comparatively small." 

So Calvin says : — 

" Indeed it is not wonderful, that they who are born in 
darkness harden themselves more and more in their stupid- 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 203 

ity, because very few (paucissimi), that they may restrain 
themselves within bounds, attend with docility to the word 
of God ; but they rather exult in their own vanity." — 
Institut. Lib. L c. 6. ^J 2. 

In commenting upon the words in the prayer 
of our Saviour, John xvii. 9, he says : — 

" Hence it appears that the whole world does not belong 
to its Creator ; only that grace snatches from the curse and 
wrath of God and from eternal death a few, who would 
otherwise perish ; but leaves the world in the ruin to which 
it has been ordained." * 

In commenting on the invitation of our Lord, 
" Come to me all ye that are weary and heavy 
laden," he remarks : — 

" All [who accept this invitation] are few in number ; 
because, out of the innumerable multitude of those who are 
perishing, but few perceive that they are perishing." — 
Comment, in Harm. Evang. 0pp. VI. 131. 

In the Westminster Assembly's Larger Cate- 
chism we are told : — 

" They who, having never heard the gospel, know not Je- 
sus Christ, and believe not in him, cannot be saved ; be they 
never so diligent to frame their lives according to the light 

* The words of this extraordinary passage deserve to be given 
in the original : — *' Unde fit ut totus mundus ad suum creatorem 
non pertineat ; nisi quod a maledictione et ira Dei, ac morte aeterna 
non multos eripit gratia, qui alioqui perituri erant ; mundum autem 
in suo interitu, cui destinatus est, relinquit." — Institut. Lib. III. 
c. 22. ^ 7. 



204 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

of nature, or the law of that religion which they profess ; 
neither is there salvation in any other, but in Christ alone, 
who is the Saviour only of his body, the Church." 

" The visible Church is a society made up of all such as 
in all ages and places of the world do profess the true relig- 
ion, and of their children." But 

" All that hear the gospel and live in the visible Church 
are not saved." — Anss. 60- 62. 

It is evident that according to the Westmin- 
ster Assembly the number of the reprobate far 
exceeds that of the elect. 

The following is from Edwards : — 

" That there are generally but few good men in the 
world, even among them that have those most distinguish- 
ing and glorious advantages for it which they are favored 
with that live under the gospel, is evident by that saying 
of our Lord, from time to time in his mouth. Many are 
called, but few are chosen. And if there are but few 
among these, how ^esv, how very few indeed, must persons 
of this character be, compared with the whole world of 
mankind ? The exceeding smallness of the number of true 
saints, compared with the whole world, appears by the rep- 
resentations often made of them as distinguished from the 
world."— Ow Original Sin. Works, VI. 190. 

" If," he says, " we observe the history of the Old Tes- 
tament, there is reason to think there never was any time, 
from Joshua to the Captivity, wherein wickedness was more 
restrained, and virtue and religion more encouraged and 
promoted, than in David's and Solomon's times. And if 
there was so little true piety in that nation that was the only 
people of God under heaven, even in their very best times, 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 205 

what may we suppose concerning the world in general, take 
one time with another ? " — Ihid. p. 192. 



As I have mentioned in the Introductory 
Note, what precedes comprises the substance 
of an article formerly published. My primary 
purpose in that article being to vindicate my- 
self from the charge of misrepresenting the doc- 
trines of Calvinism, I did not add to it any 
general remarks on the view given of those 
doctrines. But such an exhibition suggests 
many thoughts, to which it may be worth 
while to attend. It is not to be turned away 
from, as something too revolting to be steadily 
contemplated, or with any indistinct incredu- 
lity concerning the fact that such doctrines 
have been believed. It is to be regarded more 
calmly, as a great lesson in the study of human 
nature, — a melancholy lesson certainly, but 
one full of instruction. 

We must, in the first place, distinctly recog- 
nize the truth, that what is essential in the 
system has been believed, in the proper sense of 
the term, and very extensively believed. It is 
not with these as with some other doctrines of 
false religion, which those who profess them 
deceive themselves in thinking that they be- 

18 



206 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

lieve. I refer to doctrines which predicate of 
the same subject conceptions contradictory to 
each other, so that it is as impossible for any 
mind, understanding the meaning of the words, 
to receive them as true, as it would be to be- 
lieve the proposition, that a certain object is a 
triangle whose three angles form only one an- 
gle, or that a block of wood may be converted 
into a mass of gold without any change of its 
sensible properties. The doctrines we have 
been attending to involve, in their essential 
character, no such obvious verbal absurdity. It 
is not an absurdity in terms, to affirm that God 
(meaning the Supreme Ruler of All Things) is 
a malignant being, and that he forms many of 
his creatures with such natures as necessarily 
cause their eternal misery. When, indeed, it 
is affirmed that his justice requires or admits 
the infliction on men, of punishment for sins 
which he has laid them under an irresisti- 
ble necessity of committing, the proposition is 
a verbal absurdity, which can be veiled only by 
asserting, that the human mind is incapable of 
forming a right conception of the nature of ab- 
solute or perfect justice, and that the word 
"justice" is used in some unknown sense. But 
such propositions are not essential to the sys- 
tem. Without reference to them, the acts as- 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 207 

cribed to God, and the supposed nature and 
destiny of man, are stated in language perfectly 
intelligible. 

It appears, therefore, that there is nothing so 
repulsive to reason, or so revolting to our moral 
feelings, that it may not be received as a doc- 
trine of Christianity. If we look abroad, be- 
yond the confines of Christianity, to the past 
history and present state of the world, we shall 
find that it is on the subject of religion that the 
most portentous and pernicious errors have 
prevailed, — errors of superstition and errors 
of virtual atheism, — on the one hand, concep- 
tions of the spiritual world disastrously false, 
and, on the other, an abnegation of all but what 
is present and material. 

The opinions of men accustomed to think for 
themselves, especially their opinions on subjects 
of the highest interest, are professedly founded 
on reason, or, at least, claim to be in accordance 
with reason. It would be admitting a self-con- 
tradictory proposition, for any one to admit his 
belief to be unreasonable. But notwithstand- 
ing the presumption thus created, that reason 
has had much to do in the formation of men's 
religious opinions, yet we know that such an 
inference would be false. When men are spo- 
ken of, and we discourse of human nature, we 



208 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

are apt to direct our thoughts to some particu- 
lar, small class of men, perhaps the most intel- 
ligent of those with whom we are acquainted ; 
or to form some abstract notion of the capaci- 
ties of human nature, and to imagine those 
capacities as being actually exercised as they 
should be. But we ought to extend our view 
to the human race, and to consider what men 
really are, and what they have been. 

If we divide those now living out of the lim- 
its of Christendom into classes with reference 
to their ostensible or nominal opinions respect- 
ing the greatest and most important subject of 
thought, religion, we find that the largest 
of the several divisions thus made consists of 
the professed disciples of some form or other 
of Buddhism, a religion of the history and 
character of which very little is known in the 
Western world beyond a small circle of the 
learned; while, from what is known, it may 
fairly be inferred that it is little comprehended 
in any of its forms by the generality of its 
professors. Then come, as the next class, the 
Hindus, with their monstrous mythology and 
all-pervading superstitions. The division next 
in size consists of the followers of Mahomet. 
We may then notice the disciples of Confucius, 
whose nearest approach toward recognizing the 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 209 

connection between the inhabitants of this 
earth and the spiritual Universe consists in the 
rites performed at the tombs of their ancestors. 
And finally we may turn to a great miscellane- 
ous multitude of various superstitions and idol- 
atries, into which any proper religious belief or 
sentiment rarely enters as an element. These 
classes constitute a great majority of mankind. 

Among them we cannot look for a religious 
faith resting on reason. The opinions of the 
majority of mankind on the most important of 
subjects are not the result of investigation and 
thought and intelligent conviction. Nor have 
they been in any other way, by any natural in- 
stinct or perception, guided to the truth. Their 
errors and superstitions, however they origi- 
nated, are now received because they are tradi- 
tionary. The belief of them has been incorpo- 
rated with their minds at that period when 
whatever is taught is received as true, and has 
been strengthened by all surrounding circum- 
stances in after life. It has not even occurred 
to one in many thousands to subject them to 
the test of reason; and the doubts of a very 
few thinkers among nations not Christianized 
have, with very rare exceptions, such as that 
of the eminent Hindu reformer of our own 
day, led to nothing but unbelief, or, as in the 

18* 



210 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

case of the Mahometan Sufis, to vague, unintel- 
ligible mysticism. • 

If rational religion — correct views of God 
and his providence, of man and his destiny — 
is to be found anywhere, it is in the Christian 
world. To this, then, we turn ; and we per- 
ceive at once, that Christians are divided into 
distinct parties, and that, if any one of these 
parties holds a rational faith, the faith of most 
other Christians must be very erroneous. By 
far the greater part of those numbered as 
Christians is composed of the professed or nom- 
inal members either of the Romish or of the 
Greek Church, — the Greek being allied to the 
Homish in all that is essential except in ac- 
knowledging the supremacy of the Pope. In- 
telligent Protestants regard the doctrines of 
either Church as a mass of gross errors, accu- 
mulated and consolidated during centuries of 
ignorance and superstition. But where there 
is any doubt or controversy, men must be ad- 
dressed as rational beings ; and neither the 
Pomish nor the Greek Church, therefore, re- 
fuses to acknowledge the existence and jurisdic- 
tion of reason. But the appeal made to her by 
them is for an act of self-immolation, — to sac- 
rifice herself to the authority of the Church. 
Reason is called upon to acknowledge, that, as 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 211 

regards all which is further to be done or be- 
lieved, her decisions are of no value. What 
appears to her a pernicious error, a folly, or an 
absurdity, may be a sublime and momentous 
truth. Having made the submission required, 
her office ceases. She passes out of her prov- 
ince, and becomes guilty of impiety, if she med- 
dles further with doctrines which she ought 
humbly to receive. She must at once admit as 
true all that is taught by the Church, that is, 
by the priesthood. 

If, then, such a religion as reason can assent 
to, exist among men, if there be anywhere a 
correct conception of those truths which God 
taught us by his revelation of himself through 
Christ, if there be anywhere a system which, 
containing the profession of those truths, does 
not contradict and neutralize them by incorpo- 
rating with this profession the inculcation of 
opposite errors, it would seem that this system 
is to be sought for among the comparatively 
small body of Protestants. In vindicating their 
dissent they were compelled to appeal to rea- 
son. But the scheme of doctrines originally 
maintained by a great majority of those who, 
during the time of the Eeformation, separated 
from the Church of Eome, has just been pre- 
sented to view. This scheme in its original 



212 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

form, or not essentially modified, though some- 
times a little disguised (as in the Articles of 
the Church of England), is still the professed 
faith of the majority of Protestants, — professed 
in their creeds, whatever may be their real 
belief or unbelief. Most Protestant churches 
and sects likewise claim virtually the same 
control over reason as the E-omish Church. 
Our carnal reason, as it is called, must abase 
itself before the incomprehensible mysteries of 
their faith. Men should follow the directions 
that were given to the late Dr. Arnold when 
his understanding was struggling with the doc- 
trines to which his assent was required, — " to 
pause in his inquiries," and " to put down ob- 
jections by main force whenever they arose in 
his mind." * Such directions do not furnish a 
stable foundation for a firm and rational faith, 
though they do furnish a sufficient foundation 
for bigoted ignorance. 

But furthermore, it is expressly contended 
by a large portion of Protestants, and by others 
who desire to be considered as believers in the 
divine authority of Christ, that Christian faith 
is not founded on reason. It is, according to 
Calvin, a special gift of God, granted only to 

* Life of Dr. Arnold, 4th Ed. Vol. L pp. 21, 22. 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 213 

the regenerate. " There are manifest signs," he 
says, " that God speaks in the Scriptures, from 
which it appears that their doctrine is from 
Heaven " ; but these signs are not to be dis- 
cerned by the unregenerate ; " his word will 
not find faith in the hearts of men before it 
is sealed by the inward witness of the Spirit." 
" They act preposterously who endeavor to es- 
tablish a firm faith in Scripture by disputing^ * 
"Profane men, that they may not believe any 
thing foolishly or lightly, desire and demand 
that it should be proved to them by reason, 
that Moses and the Prophets spoke by divine 
inspiration. But I answer, that the testimony 
of the Spirit is more excellent than all rea- 
son." t 

In commenting on the often perverted words 
of St. Paul, which are rendered in the Common 
Version, " The natural man receiveth not the 
things of the Spirit of God ; for they are fool- 
ishness unto him; neither can he know them, 
because they are spiritually discerned," % Cal- 



* Disputando. The word is italicized in the original, from which 
I think it must be inferred that Calvin meant to use it in an invidi- 
ous, associated sense, vi^hich is uncommon, to say the least, in good 
Latin, If he did not, it should be rendered " by arguing," or " by 
argument." 

f Institut. Lib. I. c. 7. § 4. J 1 Corinthians ii. 14. 



214 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

vin says : — " The Apostle teaches that the Gos- 
pel is contemned because it is unknown; and 
that it is unknown because it is too hidden 
and sublime to be apprehended by the human 
mind, — such wisdom as so far surpasses the 
whole intelligence of man that he cannot get 
even a taste of it. For though Paul here tacit- 
ly accuses the pride of the flesh, in that men 
dare to condemn as foolish what they do not 
understand, he at the same time shows how 
great is the weakness, or rather stupidity, of the 
human mind, in denying it to be capable of spir- 
itual intelligence. For he teaches, that it is not 
merely through the perversity of the human 
will, that man, considered as man (homo ipse), 
does not attain to the things of the Spirit, but 
also through the impotence of his understand- 
ing. If he had said, men will not to be wise, 
that indeed would have been true, but he adds 
that they indeed cannot be. Whence we infer 
that faith is not in every man's power, but is 
the gift of God .In judging of the doc- 
trine of the Gospel, men's minds are of necessity 
blind till they are enlightened by the Spirit of 
God." 

The same doctrine is maintained by followers 
of Calvin at the present day, but commonly, I 
suppose, with some softening or suppression in 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 215 

the mode of stating it, for the sake of accom- 
modating it to the existing condition of men's 
minds. It is said, that " the evidence of relig- 
ious truth is the truth itself It is believed for 
its own sake. It is seen and felt to be true. 
Faith is no work of reason, and therefore can- 
not be overthrown by it, since believing no 
more arises from argument than seeing or tast- 
ing. But the great majority of men have no 
such perception of the peculiar truths of the 
Gospel. The natural man cannot discern the 
things of the Spirit. The spiritual man dis- 
cerns their excellence, and receives them be- 
cause he does discern them. The doctrines of 
Christ crucified [as an atonement for the sins 
of men], of the corruption of man [of man's na- 
ture], of the necessity of regeneration by the 
power of the Holy Ghost [of a new nature 
given by God instead of the nature with which 
he formed us], and of eternal retribution [of 
that eternal misery to which man is justly lia- 
ble for what he is by nature], do not commend 
themselves to the hearts of unrenewed men." 
Undoubtedly they do not. One may at first 
thought be disposed to assent unreservedly 
to the proposition, that a man's nature must 
be supernaturally changed before the doctrines 
of Calvinism can commend themselves to his 



216 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

heart or his moral sentiments. But some 
knowledge of what has been and what is the 
state of opinion in the world, and the exercise 
of Christian charity, may satisfy us that men, 
even in an unregenerate state, continuing as 
God made them, without having experienced 
any great moral change, natural or supernat- 
ural, are capable of receiving those doctrines. 
There is no difficulty, however, in assenting to 
the proposition, that their belief no more arises 
from argument than seeing or tasting. 

In the passage marked as quoted I have 
adopted the language of a very respectable writ- 
er, who, from his character and position, may 
be considered as a representative of the larger 
number of Presbyterians in this country.* 

Other professed Calvinists of the present day 
express themselves differently. The statutes of 
the most important and most learned of the or- 
thodox Schools of Theology in New England 
require that its Professors should be " ortho- 
dox and consistent Calvinists," and enforce the 
requisition by demanding their assent — an 
assent to be repeated every five years — to an 
elaborate creed, which, if it vary from orthodox 

* See an article in the number of the " Princeton Review " for 
January, 1840, p. 33, seqq. 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 217 

Calvinism, does so only by inclining to what 
have been, perhaps erroneously, regarded by 
some as the balder and more offensive doc- 
trines of Hopkins, an heresiarch probably but 
little known out of this country. But it is one 
of the saddest indications of the religious state 
of our times, in this country, in England, and 
elsewhere, that the solemn profession of assent 
to an orthodox creed has but little binding 
force on the minds of those who make it, 
and indicates little of their real belief The 
writer to whom I have just referred quotes 
with strong disapprobation from a distinguished 
Professor of that School the following doc- 
trine : — " The truths of Christianity have al- 
ways been addressed to the intuitive perceptions 
of the common mind." "The majority of cor- 
dial believers in the Bible know the Bible to be 
true, because they feel it to be so. Their faith 
results from the accordance of their higher na- 
ture with the spirit of the Bible." If by this 
" higher nature " be meant, as the Calvinistic 
doctrine requires, the new nature given to the 
elect, the term is unsuitable and deceptive. If 
it be used to denote something in man pre- 
vious to the change of nature which Calvinism 
insists on as necessary to salvation, — something 
equivalent to " the intuitive perceptions of the 

19 



218 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

common mind," — the position is fundamentally 
opposite to Calvinism, and is, at the same time, 
one which either a Calvinist or an anti-Calvin- 
ist must at once reject as untrue. There is 
nothing, the Calvinist maintains, in the natural 
man in accordance with the things of the 
Spirit ; and there is nothing, a mere philoso- 
pher will maintain, in the natural sentiments of 
man in accordance with the doctrines of Cal- 
vinism.. 

It may be a groundless conjecture, but the 
language last quoted seems to have been bor- 
rowed, perhaps inadvertently, from a class of 
theologians, who have been commonly known 
among us under the name of " Tran seen den tal- 
ists," with whom the followers of Calvin have 
little in common, except the rejection of rea- 
son as the foundation of religious belief But 
even in this respect there is a wide distinction 
between them, which, in the case supposed, must 
have been overlooked by the author of the pas- 
sages last quoted. The doctrines of one of the 
parties we know, for they have been presented 
with no essential difference of statement in a 
great body of creeds and other writings ; the 
doctrines of the other party, what they consider 
as constituting Christianity, we do not know 
with any precision, for there has been no agree- 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 219 

ment among the different members of the party 
in their exposition of them, nor, I suspect, has 
even the positive belief of any one member of it 
been clearly stated. But whatever conceptions 
we may form of their belief, it will not be 
denied that for the most part it is some- 
thing very dissimilar and adverse to Calvinism. 
What one party intuitively discerns to be 
true, the other party intuitively discerns to 
be false. Nor is this strange ; for the nature 
of their intuition is as diiFerent as its results. 
One party regards it as a supernatural gift of 
God to, comparatively, a small number, and 
denies the capacity of thus discerning religious 
truth to the generality of men in their natural 
state. The other contends that it is a gift of 
nature to all men. From this last position it 
would seem to follow that the vast amount of 
gross errors concerning religion, which have 
inundated Christendom and the world, is the 
result, solely, of the perversity of the human 
will. But we are debarred from this con- 
clusion by the absurdity of making intuition 
subject to the will, — by its involving the sup- 
position, that we may will not to see what we 
do see ; that a man, for example, may will, if 
he pleases, to believe that the three angles of 
an equilateral triangle are not equal. 



220 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

The concert of different Christian sects, oth- 
erwise much at variance with each other, for 
the purpose of depriving reason of her proper 
office in the highest department of thought, 
and the doctrines which in connection with it 
have been set up in opposition to reason, have 
produced their natural effects in alienating men 
from our religion. Irrational credulity has for 
its regular counterpart irrational incredulity. 
The most striking characteristics of the greater 
part of the writers of our day on the subject of 
religion are, on the one side, the inculcation of 
doctrines which the human intellect has out- 
grown, and, on the other side, the absence of 
any rational religious faith, tending to and often 
ending in atheism. I do not mean by atheism 
the denial of any power, operating according to 
certain physical laws which regulate the Uni- 
verse, and producing motion and life, — for this 
denial, though it has been virtually made or 
closely approached by some modern speculatists, 
is a mere absurdity, to be maintained by no one 
who has not quite lost sight of his reason and 
abandoned his common sense in the mazes of 
metaphysics, — but the denial of all intelligent 
action or benevolent purpose in the operations 
of that power, the denial of God in the sense of 
a being possessed of moral and intellectual at- 
tributes. 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 221 

Such being the state of things, are we to con- 
clude that religious truth is unattainable ; or 
that, if it be attainable by a few individuals, 
there are no means of procuring its general re- 
ception ] Or shall we believe that the world 
is now going on very well without it ; and that 
to ourselves individually it is a matter of little 
concern whether our characters are formed, and 
our conduct controlled, by true religious princi- 
ples, or not '? Are we to conclude, that it is the 
part of a wise man to turn away his eyes from 
the moral and religious ignorance, the debase- 
ment and annihilation of intellect, which exist 
in the Christian world 1 Should we look with 
philosophical indifference on the vices and self- 
ishness which spread through all classes of so- 
ciety, on the physical and moral wretchedness 
of the poor and the crimes which it generates, 
on oppression and tyranny, and the maddening 
passions which they are exasperating'? Should 
we regard these things as the necessary condi- 
tion of humanity 1 Or should we expect any 
great improvement only through violent changes 
of the forms of human government, in the pull- 
ing to pieces and reconstruction of human so- 
ciety'? — its reconstruction with the same mate- 
rials that now exist, greatly damaged in the 

19* 



222 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

work of demolition 1 Certainly we are to come 
to no such conclusions. 

The state of the world would be very diiFer- 
ent from what it is, if Christianity were really 
the religion of those who are numbered as 
Christians. Every essential improvement in 
the condition of men is to be hoped for only 
from the operation of Christian truth ; — not 
from errors contrary to Christian truth and 
usurping its place. Such errors may in indi- 
vidual minds have become so blended with im- 
portant truths and holy affections, that it is 
difficult to effect their separation ; they may be 
so controlled in their operation by those truths 
and affections as to become harmless ; or they 
may even have entered into such combinations 
that their partial operation is for good ; — as 
the stern courage, the unyielding endurance, 
and the other harsh virtues of our Puritan an- 
cestors, derived strength from their faith that 
they were a peculiar people, the elect of God. 
But reUgious errors considered in their direct 
and uncontrolled operation are simply perni- 
cious. Their product is only evil. They can 
form no barrier against that flood of irreligion 
and crime which threatens to overspread a great 
part of Europe, and which has made its way 
into our own country. It is only through the 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 223 

inseparable mixture of Christian truth which 
enters into every system of false religion pro- 
fessed by Christians that any good has been 
wrought. But the deluge that impends, should 
it not be stayed, will sweep away, not those sys- 
tems of false religion alone, but all those Chris- 
tian principles and sentiments which have been 
connected with them, and leave only shapeless 
piles of ruin behind. 

To make Christianity the religion of Chris- 
tendom, we must pursue a course directly oppo- 
site to that which, as we have seen, has been 
adopted by most Christian sects. The author- 
ity of reason, instead of being disparaged and 
rejected, must be fully acknowledged and ap- 
pealed to, on this, the most important subject 
that falls within her jurisdiction. Men must 
be called upon to submit to her decisions ; to 
believe and feel and do what their reason re- 
quires that they should believe and feel and 
do, and nothing beside. We must vindicate 
the authority of reason before we can hope to 
vindicate the authority of religion. Make men 
rational and you make them religious ; for true 
religion is in perfect accordance with reason. 
Let it not be said that w^e are assured of the 
highest truths of religion, of God's care for 
men, and of man's immortality, only by re vela- 



224 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

tion. This is true. But we are assured that 
such a revelation has been made only by rea- 
son. Christian faith is a rational faith. It 
has been exposed to such disastrous attacks, it 
has failed so much of producing its proper ef- 
fect, because it has commonly been presented 
to men as an irrational faith ; because its 
professors, instead of appealing to reason, have 
endeavored to withdraw it from her jurisdic- 
tion. 

At the very outset, then, the rational believer 
parts company with the great majority of 
professed Christians, and pursues an opposite 
course. The fundamental error which has been 
committed of dissociating reason from religious 
faith has been the vital principle, the necessary 
condition, of all the other errors which have so 
changed the aspect of Christianity. In the ab- 
sence of reason as a guide, there is no mistake 
into which men may not fall. The proposition 
may seem too simple and indisputable to be 
thus formally stated. But the most simple and 
indisputable truths are often the most impor- 
tant ; and when they are disregarded or con- 
temned, it becomes necessary to state them in 
their bare distinctness. Reason is the most 
sacred gift of God to man, the faculty by which 
we become accountable beings ; it is its right- 



I 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 225 

ful office to determine our belief and to regu- 
late our conduct. To withdraw ourselves from 
its control, to regard its exercise as unholy, 
to trust to any other guide that may be substi- 
tuted in its place, is to withdraw ourselves from 
the guidance of God. 

Eeason and Truth are the only hope of man- 
kind. It is through them alone that any essen- 
tial improvement in the condition of men — of 
individuals and of nations — is to be wrought 
out. Weak instruments they may be, often 
overborne and silenced by the discordant 
clamor of men's passions and prejudices and 
folly, by selfishness and sin ; — but there are 
no other. It is by reason that truth is discov- 
ered, and through reason that it is addressed to 
our hearts. By what other influence should 
they be controlled 1 By what other influence 
should our permanent afiections be formed'? 
Certainly neither by false doctrines, nor by un- 
substantial imaginations, nor by the blind, dis- 
orderly working of natural impulses good and 
bad. Intellectual truth is the essential constit- 
uent of moral goodness. Whoever acts virtu- 
ously, whoever acts with the purpose of serving 
his fellow-men, does so from a recognition, in 
thought or feeling, of the truth of his obliga- 
tions to his fellow-men ; and any strong sense 



226 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

of these obligations rests ultimately upon his 
recognizing his and their relations to God 
through a common nature as immortal beings. 
When we regard ourselves and our fellow-men 
as mere accidents of this earth, born to perish, 
our affections for them, our desire to serve 
them, must be of the same kind as those we 
may have toward the domestic animals about us, 
between whom and them we have effaced in 
our minds any essential distinction. To those 
who may think and feel thus, the happiness of 
mankind is not to be intrusted. Through the 
sense of personal suffering and wrong, through 
vindictive passions, or bitterness of temper, or 
the mere love of notoriety, the source of no 
good but of many bad actions, or from the de- 
sire to secure the power of oppression in their 
own hands and profit by it, men whose charac- 
ters afford no ground for confidence may be 
ready to fight or to rail against the established 
abuses that are preying on the happiness of 
man. But from such men nothing is to be 
looked for but the substitution, through wast- 
ing and demoralizing violence, of a new class of 
evils for those that now exist. 

The sole remedy against this flux and reflux 
of evils is to be found in the power of religion, 
— in Christianity, not such as it has often been 



VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 227 

represented to be, but such as it is ; in inform- 
ing men of all classes with its spirit and its 
truths. It was through this channel alone, 
through the Truth, that the blessings of God 
communicated by the great Benefactor of our 
race were to be conveyed to mankind. On the 
last day of his life, that day of agony and tri- 
umph, he pronounced the declaration, — "I 
was born for this end, and for this end have I 
come to the world, to bear testimony to the 
Truth." He came to bear testimony to that 
truth, religious truth, which underlies all other 
moral truth, and which alone concerns man in 
his permanent relations, his relations to God 
and eternity. It was for the establishment of 
that truth that God manifested himself through 
Christ. It was by the name of " the Truth " 
that our Lord designated his religion, thus 
identifying it with all that it most concerns us 
to believe. 

" I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life," 
— that is. Eternal Life. So he prayed for his 
immediate disciples, " Father, sanctify them 
through the Truth ; thy doctrine is Truth." 
So he promised them, " The spirit of the 
Truth," the spirit from God that accompanies 
the reception of my religion, " will guide you 
to all the Truth," to all the essential truth, 



228 VIEWS OF CALVINISM. 

which ^constitutes it. Thus he told them, 
" If you remain steadfast in what I teach, you 
will know the Truth ; and the Truth will 
make you free." They were expecting that the 
Messiah would deliver their nation from sub- 
jection to the Romans. But it was another 
sort of freedom that he promised them through 
the knowledge of the Truth. 



DISCOURSE 

ON THE 

LATEST FORM OF INFIDELITY, 

DELIVERED AT THE REQUEST OF THE 

" ASSOCIATION OF THE ALUMNI OF THE CAMBRIDGE 
THEOLOGICAL SCHOOL," 

ON THE 19th of JULY, 1839. 



20 



INTEODUCTOKY NOTE 



In the year 1830, 1 resigned (in consequence of ill health) 
my office of Professor of Sacred Literature in the Univer- 
sity in Cambridge. In 1839 the gentlemen who had been 
educated in the Theological School formed themselves into 
a society, and at their request I delivered the following ad- 
dress on the occasion of their first public meeting. 



DISCOURSE. 



I ADDRESS you, Gentlemen, and our friends 
who are assembled with us, on an occasion of 
more than common interest ; as it is your first 
meeting since joining together in a society as 
former pupils of the Theological School in this 
place. Many of you may look back over a con- 
siderable portion of time that has elapsed since 
your residence here. In thus meeting with 
those in whose society we have spent some of 
the earlier years of life, recollections are natu- 
rally called up of pleasures that are gone, of 
ties that have been broken, of hopes that have 
perished, and of bright imaginations that have 
faded away. Such recollections produce those 
serious views of our present existence with 
which religious sentiment is connected. They 
make us feel the value of a Christian's faith ; 
of that faith, which, where decay was before 

20* 



234 ON THE LATEST FORM 

written on all most dear to us, stamps immor- 
tality instead. 

I see among you many, who, I know, will 
recall our former connection with the same in- 
terest as I do, and whom I am privileged to re- 
gard as friends. As for those of you. Gentle- 
men, to whom I have not stood in the relation 
of an instructor, we also have an intimate con- 
nection with each other. Your office is to de- 
fend, explain, and enforce the truths of Christi- 
anity ; and with the importance of those truths 
no one can be more deeply impressed than my- 
self So far as you are faithful to your duty, 
the strong sympathy of all good men is with 
you. 

But we meet in a revolutionary and uncer- 
tain state of religious opinion, existing through- 
out what is called the Christian world. Our 
religion is very imperfectly understood, and re- 
ceived by comparatively a small number with 
intelligent faith. In proportion as our view is 
more extended, and we are better acquainted 
with what is and what has been, we shall be- 
come more sensible of the great changes that 
have long been in preparation, but which of 
late have been rapidly developed. The present 
state of things imposes new responsibilities 
upon all who know the value of our faith and 



OF INFIDELITY. 235 

have ability to maintain it. Let us then em- 
ploy this occasion in considering some of the 
characteristics of the times, and some of those 
opinions now prevalent, which are at war with 
a belief in Christianity. 

By a belief in Christianity, we mean the be- 
lief that Christianity is a revelation by God of 
the truths of religion ; and that the divine au- 
thority of him whom God commissioned to 
speak to us in his name was attested, in the 
only mode in which it could be, by miraculous 
displays of his power. Religious truths are 
those truths, and those alone, which concern 
the relations of man to God and eternity. It is 
only as an immortal being and a creature of 
God, that man is capable of religion. Now 
those truths which concern our higher nature, 
and all that can with reason deeply interest us 
in our existence, we Christians receive, as we 
trust, on the testimony of God. He who re- 
jects Christianity must admit them, if he admit 
them at all, upon some other evidence. 

But the fundamental truths of religion taught 
by Christianity became very early connected 
with human speculations, to which the same 
importance was gradually attached, and for the 
proof of which the same divine authority was 
claimed. These speculations spread out and 



^36 ON THE LATEST FORM 

consolidated into systems of theology, present- 
ing aspects equally hostile to reason and to our 
faith ; so hostile, that, for many centuries, a 
true Christian in belief and heart, earnest to 
communicate to others the blessings of his faith, 
would have experienced, anywhere in Christen- 
dom, a fate similar to that which his Master 
suffered among the Jews. It would be taking 
a different subject from what I have proposed, 
to attempt to explain and trace the causes of 
this monstrous phenomenon. The false repre- 
sentations of Christianity, that have come down 
to us from less enlightened times, have ceased 
to retain their power over far the larger portion 
of those individuals who form, for good or evil, 
the character of the age in which they live. 
But the reaction of the human intellect and 
heart against their imposition has as yet had 
but little tendency to procure the reception of 
more correct notions of Christianity. On the 
contrary, the inveterate and enormous errors 
that have prevailed have so perverted men's 
conceptions, have so obscured and perplexed 
the whole subject, have so stood in the way of 
all correct knowledge of facts, and all just rea- 
soning; there are so few works in Christian 
theology not at least colored and tainted by 
them ; and they still present such obstacles at 



OF INFIDELITY. 237 

every step to a rational investigation of the 
truth; that the degree of learning, reflection, 
judgment, freedom from worldly influences, and 
independence of thought, necessary to ascertain 
for one's self the true character of Christianity, 
is to be expected from but fev^. The greater 
number, consequently, confound the systems 
that have been substituted for it with Christi- 
anity itself, and receive them in its stead, or, in 
rejecting them, reject our faith. The tendency 
of the age is to the latter result. 

This tendency is strengthened by the politi- 
cal action of the times, especially in the Old 
World. Ancient institutions and traditionary 
power are there struggling to maintain them- 
selves against the vast amount of new energy 
that has been brought into action. Long-exist- 
ing forms of society are giving way. The old 
prejudices by which they were propped up are 
decaying. Wise men look with awe at the 
spectacle; as if they saw in some vast tower, 
hanging over a populous city, rents opening, 
and its sides crumbling and inclining. But in 
the contest between the new and the old, which 
has spread over Europe, erroneous representa- 
tions of Christianity are in alliance with estab- 
lished power. They have long been so. The 
institutions connected with them have long 



238 ON THE LATEST FORM 

been principal sources of rank and emolument. 
What passes for Christianity is thus placed in 
opposition to the demands of the mass of men, 
and is regarded by them as inimical to their 
rights ; while, on the other hand, those to 
whom false Christianity affords aid repel all 
examination into the genuineness of its claims. 

The commotion of men's minds in the rest of 
the civilized world produces a sympathetic ac- 
tion in our own country. We have indeed but 
little to guard us against the influence of the 
depraving literature and noxious speculations 
which flow in among us from Europe. We 
have not yet any considerable body of intellect- 
ual men, devoted to the higher departments of 
thought, and capable of informing and guiding 
others in attaining the truth. There is no con- 
trolling power of intellect among us. 

Christianity, then, has been grossly misrepre- 
sented, is very imperfectly understood, and pow- 
erful causes are in operation to obstruct all cor- 
rect knowledge of it, and to withdraw men's 
thoughts and affections from it. But at the 
present day there is little of that avowed and 
zealous infidelity, the infidelity of highly popu- 
lar authors, acknowledged enemies of our faith, 
which characterized the latter half of the last 
century. Their writings, often disfigured by 



OF INFIDELITY. 239 

gross immoralities, are now falling into disre- 
pute. But the effects of those writings, and of 
the deeply seated causes by which they were 
produced, are still widely diffused. There is 
now no bitter warfare against Christianity, be- 
cause such men as then waged it would now 
consider our religion as but a name, a pretence, 
the obsolete religion of the state, the supersti- 
tion of the vulgar. But infidelity has but as- 
sumed another form, and in Europe, and espe- 
cially in Germany, has made its way among a 
very large portion of nominally Christian theo- 
logians. Among them are now to be found 
those whose writings are most hostile to all 
that characterizes our faith. Christianity is 
undermined by them with the pretence of set- 
tling its foundations anew. Phantoms are 
substituted for the realities of revelation. 

It is asserted, apparently on good authority, 
that the celebrated atheist Spinoza composed 
the work in which his opinions are most fully 
unfolded, in the Dutch language, and commit- 
ted it to his friend, the physician Meyer, to 
translate into Latin ; that, where the name God 
now appears, Spinoza had written Nature ; but 
that Meyer induced him to substitute the for- 
mer word for the latter, in order partially to 
screen himself from the odium to which he 



240 ON THE LATEST FORM 

might be exposed.* Whether this anecdote be 
true or not, a similar abuse of language appears 
in many of the works to which I refer. The 
holiest names are there ; a superficial or igno- 
rant reader may be imposed upon by their oc- 
currence ; but they are there as words of show, 
devoid of their essential meaning, and perverted 
to express some formless and powerless concep- 
tion. In Germany the theology of which I 
speak has allied itself with atheism, with pan- 
theism, and with the other irreligious specula- 
tions that have appeared in those metaphysical 
systems from which the God of Christianity is 
excluded. 

There is no subject of historical inquiry of 
more interest than the history of opinions ; 
there is none of more immediate concern than 
the state of opinions ; for opinions govern the 

* See Le Clerc's " Bibliotheque Ancienne et Moderne," Tom. 
XV. p. 433 ; Tom. XXII. p. 135. This account, which Le Clerc 
says was given him in writing by a man worthy of credit, is con- 
firmed not merely by the whole tenor of Spinoza's system, but by 
his use of the words " God " and " nature " as interchangeable. 
Thus he says in the Preface to the fourth Part of his Ethics, — 
" We have shown in the Appendix to the first Part, that Nature 
does not act for any end. For that eternal and infinite being, 
which we call God or Nature, acts by the same necessity by which 
it exists. The reason, therefore, or cause why God or Nature 
acts, and why it exists, is one and the same. As it exists for no 
end, so it acts for no end." 



OF INFIDELITY. 241 

world. Except in casej of strong temptation, 
men's evil passions must coincide with or must 
pervert their opinions, before they can obtain 
the mastery. It is, therefore, not a light ques- 
tion, what men think of Christianity. It is a 
question on which, in the judgment of an intel- 
ligent believer, the condition of the civilized 
world depends. With these views we will con- 
sider the aspect that infidelity has taken in our 
times. 

The latest form of infidelity is distinguished 
by assuming the Christian name, while it 
strikes directly at the root of faith in Christian- 
ity, and indirectly of all religion, by denying 
the miracles attesting the divine mission of 
Christ. The first writer, so far as I know, 
who maintained the impossibility of a miracle 
was Spinoza, whose argument, disengaged from 
the use of language foreign from his opinions, 
is simply this, that the laws of nature are the 
laws by which God is bound. Nature and God 
being the same, and therefore laws from which 
Nature or God can never depart.* The argu- 
ment is founded on atheism. The denial of the 
possibility of miracles must involve the denial 
of the existence of God ; since, if there be a 

* See his " Tractatus Theologico-Politicus," particularly Cap. 
VI. 

21 



242 ON THE LATEST FORM 

God, in the proper senje of the word, there can 
be no room for doubt that he may act in a 
manner different from that in which he displays 
his power in the ordinary operations of nature. 
It deserves notice, however, that in Spinoza's 
discussion of this subject we find that affecta- 
tion of religious language, and of religious rev- 
erence and concern, which is so striking a char- 
acteristic of many of the irreligious speculations 
of our day, and of which he, perhaps, furnished 
the prototype ; for he has been regarded as a 
profound teacher, a patriarch of truth, by some 
of the most noted among the infidel philoso- 
phers and theologians of Germany. " I will 
show from Scripture," he says, " that the de- 
crees and commands of God, and consequently 
his providence, are nothing but the order of 

nature If any thing should take place 

in nature which does not follow from its laws, 
that would necessarily be repugnant to the 
order which God has established in nature by 
its universal laws, and, therefore, contrary to 
nature and its laws ; and consequently the be- 
lief of such an event would cause universal 
doubt, and lead to atheism." * So strong a 
hold has religion upon the inmost nature of 

* Ibid., Cap. \l. 



OF INFIDELITY. 243 

man, that even its enemies, in order to delude 
their followers, thus assume its aspect and mock 
its tones. 

What has been stated is the great argument 
of Spinoza, to which every thing in his discus- 
sion of the subject refers ; but this discussion 
may appear like the text-book of much that 
has been written in modern times concerning 
it. There is one, however, among the writings 
against the miracles of Christianity, of a differ- 
ent kind, the famous Essay of Hume. None 
has drawn more attention, or has more served 
as a groundwork for infidelity. Yet, consider- 
ing the sagacity of the author, and the celeb- 
rity of his work, it is remarkable, that, in his 
main argument, the whole point to be proved 
is broadly assumed in the premises. " It is a 
miracle," he says, " that a dead man should 
come to life ; because that has never been ob- 
served in any age or country. There must, 
therefore, be a uniform experience against every 
miraculous event; otherwise the event would 
not merit that appellation." The conclusion, if 
conclusion it may be called, is easily made. If 
a miracle has never been observed in any age 
or country, if uniform experience shoAVS that 
no miracle ever occurred, then it follows that 
all accounts of past miracles are undeserving of 



244 ON THE LATEST FORM 

credit. But if there be an attempt to stretch 
this easy conclusion, and to represent it as in- 
volving the intrinsic incredibility of a miracle, 
the argument immediately gives way. " Expe- 
rience," says Hume, " is our only guide in rea- 
soning concerning matters of fact." Experi- 
ence is the foundation of such reasoning, but 
we may draw inferences from our experience. 
We may conclude from it the existence of a 
power capable of works which we have never 
known it to perform ; and no one, it may be 
presumed, who believes that there is a God, 
will say, that he is convinced by his experience, 
that God can manifest his power only in con- 
formity to the laws which he has imposed upon 
nature. 

Hume cannot be charged with affecting re- 
ligion ; but in the conclusion of his Essay, he 
says, in mockery, " I am the better pleased 
with the method of reasoning here delivered, as 
I think it may serve to confound those danger- 
ous friends, or disguised enemies, to the Chris- 
tian religion, who have undertaken to defend it 
by the principles of human reason. Our most 
holy religion is founded on faith^ not on rea- 
son ; and it is a sure method of exposing it, to 
put it to such a trial as it is by no means fitted 
to endure." What Hume said in derision has 



OF INFIDELITY. 245 

been virtually repeated, apparently in earnest, 
by some of the modern disbelievers of miracles, 
who still choose to profess a belief in Chris- 
tianity. 

To deny that a miracle is capable of proof, 
or to deny that it may be proved by evidence 
of the same nature as establishes the truth of 
other events, is, in effect, as I have said, to 
deny the existence of God. A miracle can be 
incapable of proof, only because it is physically 
or morally impossible ; since what is possible 
may be proved. To deny that the truth of a 
miracle may be established, involves the denial 
of creation ; for there can be no greater miracle 
than creation. It equally implies, that no spe- 
cies of being that propagates its kind ever had 
a commencement ; for if there was a first plant 
that grew without seed, or a first man without 
parents, or if of any series of events there was 
a first without such antecedents as the laws of 
nature require, then there was a miracle. So 
far is a miracle from being incapable of proof, 
that you can escape from the necessity of be- 
lieving innumerable miracles, only by believing 
that man, and all other animals, and all plants, 
have existed from eternity upon this earth, 
without commencement of propagation, there 
never having been a first of any species. No 

SI'* 



246 ON THE LATEST FORM 

one, at the present day, will maintain with Lu- 
cretius, that they were generated from inani- 
mate matter, by the fermentation of heat and 
moisture. Nothing can seem more simple or 
conclusive than the view we have taken ; but 
we may render it more familiar by an appeal to 
fact. The science of geology has shown us, 
that man is but a late inhabitant of the earth. 
The first individuals of our race, then, were not 
produced as all others have been. They were 
formed by a miracle, or, in other words, by an 
act of God's power, exerted in a different man- 
ner from that in which it operates according to 
the established laws of nature. Creation, the 
most conspicuous, is at the same time the most 
undeniable, of miracles. 

By any one who admits that God exists, in 
the proper sense of the words, his power to 
effect a miracle cannot be doubted ; and it 
would be the excess of human presumption and 
folly to affirm, that it would be inconsistent 
with his wisdom and goodness ever to exert his 
power except in those modes of action which 
he has prescribed to himself in what we call 
the laws of nature. 

On the contrary, a religious philosopher may 
regard the uniformity of the manifestations of 
God's power in the course of nature, as solely 



OF INFIDELITY. 247 

intended by him to afford a stable ground for 
calculation and action to his rational creatures ; 
which could not exist, if the antecedents that 
we call causes were not, in all ordinary cases, 
the signs of consequent effects. This uniform- 
ity is necessary to enable created beings to be 
rational agents. The Deity has imposed upon 
himself no arbitrary and mechanical laws. It 
is solely, so far as we can perceive, for the sake 
of his creatures, that he preserves the uniform- 
ity of action that exists in his works. Beyond 
the sphere of their observation, where this 
cause ceases, w^e have no ground for the belief 
of its continuance. There is nothing to war- 
rant the opinion, that the Deity still restrains 
his power by an adherence to laws, the observ- 
ance of which his creatures cannot recognize. 
We have strong reasons for believing that such 
an apparently causeless uniformity of operation 
would produce, not good, but evil. We have 
no ground for supposing that the operation of 
the laws of nature, with which we are acquaint- 
ed, extends beyond the ken of human observa- 
tion ; or that these laws are any thing more 
than a superficial manifestation of God's power, 
the mere exterior phenomena of the universe. 
We have no reason to doubt that the creation 
may be full of hidden miracles. 



248 ON THE LATEST FORM 

But, if the uniformity of the laws of nature, 
so far as they fall within our cognizance, is or- 
dained by God for the good of his creatures, 
then, should a case occur in which a great 
blessing is to be bestowed upon them, the dis- 
pensing of which requires that he should act 
in other modes, no presumption would exist 
against his so acting. So far as we are able to 
discern, there would be no reason to doubt that 
he would so act. A miracle is improbable, 
when we can perceive no sufficient cause in 
reference to his creatures, why the Deity should 
vary his modes of operation ; it ceases to be so, 
when such a cause is assigned. But Christian- 
ity claims to reveal facts, a knowledge of which 
is essential to the moral and spiritual regenera- 
tion of men ; and to offer, in attestation of the 
truth of those facts, the only satisfactory proof, 
the authority of God, evidenced by miraculous 
displays of his power. The supposed interpo- 
sition of God corresponds to the weighty pur- 
pose which it is represented as effecting. If 
Christianity profess to teach truths of infinite 
moment ; if we perceive, that such is the char- 
acter of its teachings ; if, indeed, they are true ; 
and if we are satisfied, from the exercise of our 
own reason and the history of the world, that 
they relate to facts concerning our relations 



OF INFIDELITY. 249 

and destiny, of which we could otherwise ob- 
tain no assurance, then this character of our 
religion removes all presumption against its 
claims to a miraculous origin. 

But incredulity respecting the miracles of 
Christianity rarely has its source in any process 
of reasoning. It is commonly produced by the 
gross misrepresentations which have been made 
of Christianity. It has also another cause, 
deeply seated in our nature ; — the inaptitude 
and reluctance of men to extend their view be- 
yond the present and sensible, to raise them- 
selves above the interests, the vexations, the 
pleasures, innocent or criminal, that lie within 
the horizon of a year or a week ; and to* open 
their minds to those thoughts and feelings that 
rush in with the clear apprehension of the fact, 
that the barrier between the eternal and the 
finite world has been thrown open. A relig- 
ious horror may come over us, so that 

" We fain would skulk beneath our wonted covering, 
Mean as it is." 

Man, indeed, in his low estate, loves the super- 
natural ; but it is the supernatural addressed to 
the imagination, not in all its naked distinct- 
ness to the soul ; it is the supernatural as be- 
longing to some form of faith more connected 
with this world than the future ; or regarded 



250 ON THE LATEST FORM 

as the operation of limited beings, presenting a 
semblance of human nature, on whom man can 
react in his turn. But let us imagine, if we 
can, what would be the feelings of an enlight- 
ened philosopher, were he to witness an un- 
questionable miracle, a work breaking through 
the secondary agency behind which the Deity 
ordinarily veils himself, and bringing us into 
immediate connection with him. We can 
hardly conceive of the awe, the almost appall- 
ing feeling, with which it would be contemplat- 
ed by one fully capable of comprehending its 
character, and alive to all its relations. The 
miracles of Christianity, when they are brought 
home to the mind as realities, have somewhat 
of the same power ; dimmed as they are by dis- 
tance, and clouded over by all the errors that 
false Christianity has gathered round them. If 
they be true, if Christianity be true, if its doc- 
trines be certain, it is the most solemn fact we 
can comprehend, as well as the most joyful. 
It requires that our whole character should be 
conformed to the new relations which it makes 
known. All things around us change their as- 
pect. Life and death are not what they were. 
We are walking on the confines of an unknown 
and eternal world, where none of those earthly 
passions, that now agitate men so strongly, can 



OF INFIDELITY. 251 

find entrance. They bear upon them the mark 
of their doom, soon to perish. But from the 
revulsion of feeling that must take place when 
the character of all that surrounds us is thus 
changed, and the objects of eternity appear be- 
fore the mind's eye, it is natural that many 
should shrink, and endeavor to escape from the 
view, and to forget it amid the familiar things 
of life ; clinging to a vain conception, vain as 
regards each individual, of an unchanging sta- 
bility in the order of nature. 

Vain, I say, as regards each individual. 
Whatever we may fancy respecting the un- 
changeableness of the present order of things, 
to us it is not permanent. If we are to exist 
as individuals after death, then we shall soon 
be called, not to witness, but to be the subjects, 
of a miracle of unspeakable interest to us. 
Death will be to us an incontrovertible mira- 
cle. For us the present order of things will 
cease, and the unseen world, from which we 
may have held back our imagination, our feel- 
ings, and our belief, will be around us in all its 
reality. 

If it were not for the abuse of language and 
confusion of thought that have prevailed, it 
would be idle to say, that, in denying the mi- 
raculous .character of Christianity, the truth of 



252 ON THE LATEST FORM 

Christianity is denied. Christianity was in it- 
self a transcendent miracle. It was a revela- 
tion from God to men of their eternal relations 
to Him, — an assurance from Him of truths 
concerning their highest interests, of which 
they could attain assurance from no other 
source. It was God's hand raising the veil 
that separated the material from the spiritual 
world. Christ was commissioned by God to 
speak to us in His name, and to make known 
to us on His authority those truths which it 
most concerns us to know ; and there can be 
no greater miracle than this. No proof of 
his divine commission could be afforded, but 
through miraculous displays of God's power. 
Nothing is left that can be called Christianity, 
if its miraculous character be denied. Its es- 
sence is gone ; its evidence is annihilated. Its 
truths, involving the highest interests of man, 
the facts which it makes known, and which are 
implied in its very existence as a divine revela- 
tion, rest no longer on the authority of God. 
In evidence of those truths nothing remains 
but the pretended assertions of an individual, 
of whom we know very little, except that his 
history and his declarations must have been 
most grossly misrepresented. 

It is indeed difficult to conjecture what any 



OF INFIDELITY. 253 

one can fancy himself to believe of the history 
of Christ, who rejects the belief of his divine 
commission and miraculous powers. AVhat 
conception can such a one form of his charac- 
ter '? His whole history, as recorded in the 
Gospels, is miraculous. It is vain to attempt 
to strike out what relates directly or indirectly 
to his miraculous authority and works, with 
the expectation that any thing consistent or co- 
herent will remain. It is as if one were to un- 
dertake to cut out from a precious agate the 
figure which nature has inwrought, and to pre- 
tend, that, by the removal of this accidental 
blemish, the stone might be left in its original 
form. If the accounts of Christ's miracles are 
mere fictions, then no credit can be due to 
works so fabulous as the pretended histories of 
his life. 

But these supposed miracles, it has been 
contended, may be explained, consistently with 
the veracity of the reporters, as natural events, 
the character of which was mistaken by the be- 
holders. At the first glance it is obvious, that 
such a statement supposes mistakes committed 
by those beholders, the disciples and Apostles 
of Jesus, hardly consistent with any exercise of 
intellect; and, at the same time, renders it 
very difficult to free his character from the sus- 

22 



254 ON THE LATEST FORM 

picion of intentional fraud. A little further 
consideration may satisfy us, that, if Jesus 
really performed no miracles, the accounts of 
his life that have been handed down from his 
disciples give evidence of utter folly, or the 
grossest deception, or rather of both. 

But let us suppose that the account of some 
one or more of the miracles of Christ, espe- 
cially if detached from its connection, and from 
all that determines its meaning, admits of be- 
ing explained as having its origin in some nat- 
ural event. Take any case one will, however, 
it must be admitted, that the explanation is 
not obvious, that it is conjectural; and, in a 
great majority of cases, it must be allowed, that 
it is merely possible, and that, to render it 
deserving of notice, the principle is to be as- 
sumed, that whatever is supernatural must be 
expunged from his history. We will suppose 
ourselves, then, to have tried this mode of in- 
terpretation on one narrative, and to have found 
it improbable. But, suspending our opinion, 
let us pass on to another solution of a similar 
character. A new improbability arises, and 
after that a new one. These improbabilities 
consequently multiply upon us in a geometrical 
ratio, and very soon become altogether over- 
whelming. Yet I speak not of what may be 



OF INFIDELITY. 255 

done, but of what has been done. This process 
of misinterpretation has been laboriously pur- 
sued through the Gospels ; * and the result has 
been a mass of monstrous conjectures, and 
abortive solutions, on which, as we proceed, 
there falls no glimmering of probability ; and 
which continually shock and grate against all 
our most cherished sentiments of the inestima- 
ble value of Christianity, of admiration and 
love for its Founder on earth, and of reverence 
for its divine Author. 

The proposition, that the history of Jesus is 
miraculous throughout, is to be understood in 
all its comprehensiveness. It is not merely 
that his history is full of accounts of his mira- 
cles ; it is, that every thing in his history, what 
relates to himself and what relates to others, is 
conformed to this fact, and to the conception 
of him as speaking with authority from God. 
This is what constitutes the internal evidence 
of Christianity, a term, as I have said, often 
used of late with a very indistinct notion of 
any meaning attached to it. The consistency 
in the representations given by the different 
Evangelists of the actions and words of Christ, 
as a messenger from God to men ; their consis- 

* See, for example, Paulus's " Commentary on the Gospels " ; 
and his " Life of Jesus." 



256 ON THE LATEST FORM 

tency in the representation of a character which 
it is impossible they should have conceived of, 
if it had not been exhibited before them, gives 
us an assurance of their truth, that becomes 
clearer in proportion as their writings are more 
studied and better understood ; and in connec- 
tion with this is the consistency of their whole 
narrative ; the coherence and naturalness with 
which all the words and actions of others bear 
upon events and upon a character so marvel- 
lous, and imply their existence. 

The words of Christ, equally with his mira- 
cles, imply his mission from God. They are 
accordant only with the conception of him as 
speaking with authority from God. They 
would be altogether unsuitable to a merely 
human teacher of religious truth. So consid- 
ered, if not the language of an impostor, they 
become the language of the most daring and 
crazy fanaticism. I speak of the general char- 
acter of his discourses, a character of the most 
striking peculiarity. In ascribing them to one 
not miraculously commissioned by God, they 
must be utterly changed and degraded. What 
is most solemn and sublime must either be re- 
jected as never having been spoken by him, or 
its meaning must be thoroughly perverted ; it 
must be diluted into folly, that it may not be 
blasphemy. 



OF INFIDELITY. 257 

" I am. the good shepherd," said Jesus, " and 

lay down my life for my sheep For 

this, the Father loves me ; for I lay down my 
life, to receive it again. None takes it from 
me ; but I lay it down of my own accord. I 
have a commission to lay it down, and I have a 
commission to receive it again. This charge I 
received from my Father." There are but two 
aspects under which such words can be regard- 
ed, if you suppose it true that they were ut- 
tered by Jesus. You must say, in effect, with 
the unbelieving Jews who heard him, " He is 
possessed by a demon and is mad. Why listen 
to him '? " Or the view which we take must 
be essentially that of others who were pres- 
ent : " Can a demoniac open the eyes of the 
blind]" 

Let us look at another passage. To a Chris- 
tian it appears of unspeakable grandeur and of 
infinite moment. It presents before him the 
Founder of his religion as contemplating the 
immeasurable extent of blessings of which God 
had made him the minister, as announcing 
man's immortality amid the sufferings of hu- 
manity, on the threshold of the tomb. 

"I am the resurrection and the life. He 
who has faith in me, though he die, shall live ; 



258 ON THE LATEST FORM 

and he who lives as a believer in me shall nev- 
er die. Hast thou faith in this 1 " 

Let us go on to the sepulchre of Lazarus. 

" I thank thee, Father, that thou hast heard 
me ; and I know that thou hearest me always ; 
but I have thus spoken for the sake of the 
multitude who are standing round, that they 
may believe that thou hast sent me." 

We must, then, believe that Jesus Christ was 
sent by God, commissioned to speak to us in 
his name ; or we cannot reasonably pretend to 
know any thing concerning him. We may 
think it probable, that he was a reformer of the 
religion of his nation, who preached for some 
short time, principally in Galilee ; but, having 
very soon made himself an object of general 
odium, was put to death as a malefactor, amid 
the execrations of his countrymen, who then 
strove, though ineffectually, to suppress his fol- 
lowers. Or, we m.ay fancy him an untaught, 
but enlightened philosopher, whose character, 
words, and deeds, whatever they were, have 
been absurdly and fraudulently misrepresented 
by his disciples. Or, as the Gospels cannot be 
regarded as true histories, we may go on to the 
conclusion at which infidelity, in its folly and 
ignorance, arrived within the memory of some 
of us, that no such individual existed, and that 



OF INFIDELITY. 259 

Christ is but an allegorical personage. But to 
whatever conclusion we may come, if the repre- 
sentation of him in the Gospels be not con- 
formed to his real character and office, no foun- 
dation is left, on which any one can with reason 
pretend to regard him as an object of venera- 
tion, or to consider his teachings, whatever 
effect they may have had upon the world, as of 
any importance to himself. 

To an infidel, whether he openly profess 
himself to be so, or whether he call himself a 
Christian, the history in the Gospels must pre- 
sent an insolvable problem. In the ibrmer 
case, he may turn from it, and say that he is 
not called upon to solve it ; but in the latter, 
he is, by his profession, bound to do so. He 
has taken upon himself the task of explaining 
away the history as it stands, and substituting 
another in its stead ; and of so fabricating the 
new history, that it may afford him ground for 
professing admiration and love for the real 
character of Christ. 

The rejection of Christianity, in any proper 
sense of the word, the denial that God revealed 
himself by Christ, the denial of the truth of the 
Gospel history, or, as it is called in the lan- 
guage of the sect, the rejection of historical 



260 ON THE LATEST FORM 

Christianity, is, of course, accompanied by the 
rejection of all that mass of evidence, which, in 
the view of a Christian, establishes the truth of 
his religion. This evidence, it is said, consists 
only of probabilities. We want certainty. 
The dwellers in the region of shadows com- 
plain, that the solid earth is not stable enough 
for them to rest on. They have firm footing 
on the clouds. 

To the demand for certainty, let it come 
from whom it may, I answer, that I know of 
no absolute certainty, beyond the limit of mo- 
mentary consciousness, a certainty that van- 
ishes the instant it exists, and is lost in the re- 
gion of metaphysical doubt. Beyond this limit, 
absolute certainty, so far as human reason may 
judge, cannot be the privilege of any finite be- 
ing. When we talk of certainty, a wise man 
will remember what he is, and the narrow 
bounds of his wisdom and of his powers. A 
few years ago he was not. A few years ago he 
was an infant in his mother's arms, and could 
but express his wants, and move himself, and 
smile and cry. He has been introduced into a 
boundless universe, boundless to human thought 
in extent and past duration. An eternity had 
preceded his existence. Whence came the mi- 
nute particle of life that he now enjoys ? Why 



OF INFIDELITX. 261 

is he here ] Is he only with other beings like 
himself, that are continually rising up and 
sinking in the shoreless ocean of existence ; or 
is there a Creator, Father, and Disposer of all 1 
Is he to continue a conscious being after this 
life, and undergo new changes ; or is death, 
-which he sees everywhere around him, to be 
the real, as it is the apparent, end of what 
w^ould then seem to be a purposeless and in- 
comprehensible existence '? He feels happiness 
and misery; and would understand how he 
may avoid the one and secure the other. He 
is restlessly urged on in pursuit of one object 
after another ; many of them hurtful ; most of 
them such as the changes of life, or possession 
itself, or disease, or age, will deprive of their 
power of gratifying ; while, at the same time, 
if he be unenlightened by revelation, the dark- 
ness of the future is rapidly closing round him. 
What objects should he pursue ] How, if that 
be possible, is happiness to be secured ] A 
creature of a day, just endued with the capaci- 
ty of thought, at first receiving all his opinions 
from those who have preceded him, entangled 
among numberless prejudices, confused by his 
passions, perceiving, if the eyes of his under- 
standing are opened, that the sphere of his 
knowledge is hemmed in by an infinity of 



262 ON THE LATEST FORM 

which he is ignorant, from which unknown re- 
gion clouds are often passing over, and darken- 
ing what seemed clearest to his view, — such a 
being cannot pretend to attain, by his unassist- 
ed powers, any assurance concerning the unseen 
and the eternal, the great objects of religion. 

If men had been capable of comprehending 
their weakness and ignorance, and of reflecting 
deeply on their condition here, a universal cry 
would have risen from their hearts, imploring 
their God, if there were one, to reveal himself, 
and to make known to them their destiny. 
Their wants have been answered by God before 
they were uttered. Such is the belief of a 
Christian ; and there is no question more wor- 
thy of consideration, than whether this belief 
be well founded. It can be determined only 
by the exercise of that reason which God has 
given us for our guidance in all that concerns 
us. There can be no intuition, no direct per- 
ception, of the truth of Christianity, no meta- 
physical certainty. But it would be folly, in- 
deed, to reject the testimony of God concerning 
all our higher relations and interests, because 
we can have no assurance that he has spoken 
through Christ, except such as the condition of 
our nature admits of. 

It is important for us to understand, that, in 



OF INFIDELITY. 263 

all things of practical import, in the exercise of 
all our aifections, in the whole formation of our 
characters, we are acting, and must act, on 
probabilities alone. Certainty, in the meta- 
physical sense of the word, has nothing to do 
with the concerns of men, as respects this life 
or the future. We must discuss the subject of 
religion as we do all other subjects, when men 
talk with men about matters in which they are 
in earnest. It would be considered rather as 
insanity, than folly, were any one to introduce 
metaphysical scepticism, concerning causality, 
or identity, or the existence of the external 
world, or the foundation of human knowledge, 
into a discussion concerning the affairs of this 
life, the establishment of a manufactory, for ex- 
ample, or the building of a railroad ; or if he 
should bring it forward to shake our confidence 
in the facts of which human testimony and our 
own experience assure us, or to invalidate the 
conclusions, so far as they relate to this world, 
which we found on those facts. But we must 
use the same faculties, and adopt the same 
rules, in judging concerning the facts of the 
world which we have not seen, as concerning 
those of the world of which we have seen a 
very little. 

If it can be shown, according to the common 



264 ON THE LATEST FORM 

and established principles of reasoning among 
men, that Christianity is true ; if it can be 
shown, that to suppose it not true is to sup- 
pose a moral impossibility, we need no further 
evidence. When we have arrived at this con- 
clusion, our ears will be opened to the accord- 
ant voice from the earth and from the skies, 
which bears testimony to a beneficent Creator. 
We shall find in the immortality assured to us 
by Christianity, a solution of the problem of 
our present life ; a solution, which the very ex- 
istence of that problem confirms. We shall 
perceive, that all which has been taught us by 
God's revelation corresponds with all that our 
reason, in its highest exercise, had before been 
striving to establish. Religion will become to 
us a conviction. And what conviction, I do 
not say more probable, but what conviction, of 
any comparative weight, can be opposed to it 1 
We plan for the future; we propose to our- 
selves some object to be attained within a short 
period, or during a course of years. But we 
proceed throughout upon probabilities ; upon 
a probable judgment of its value, of our power 
to secure it, of the means at our command, and 
of the accidents by which we may be favored ; 
and among all these uncertainties enters one 
far graver, the uncertainty of life itself. Yet 



OF INFIDELITY. 265 

we go on. But, if Christianity be true, there 
is no doubt about our ability to attain those 
objects which a religious man proposes to him- 
self ; there is no doubt of their inestimable val- 
ue ; and the uncertainty or the shortness of life 
at once ceases to enter into our calculations. 

Of the facts on which religion is founded, we 
can pretend to no assurance except that de- 
rived from the testimony of God, from the 
Christian revelation. He who has received 
this testimony is a Christian ; and we may ask 
now, as was asked by an Apostle, " Who is he 
that overcomes the world, but he who believes 
that Jesus is the Son of God 1 " Christian 
faith alone affords such consolation and sup- 
port as the heart needs amid the deprivations 
and sufferings of life ; it alone gives action and 
strength to all that is noblest in our nature ; it 
alone furnishes a permanent and effectual mo- 
tive for growing virtue ; it alone enables man 
to act conformably to his nature and destiny. 
This is always true. But we may have a deep- 
er sense of the value of our faith, if we look 
abroad on the present state of the world, and 
see, all around, the waves heaving and the tem- 
pest rising. Everywhere are instability and un- 
certainty. But from the blind conflict between 
men exasperated and degraded by injustice and 

23 



266 ON THE LATEST FORM 

suffering, and men corrupted and hardened by 
the abuse of power, from the mutual outrages 
of angry political parties, in which the most 
unprincipled and violent become the leaders, 
from the fierce collision of mere earthly pas- 
sions and cravings, whatever changes may re- 
sult, no good is to be hoped. All improve- 
ment in the civilized world, all advance in hu- 
man happiness, is identified with the spread of 
Christian principles, of Christian truth, of that 
faith, resting on reason, which connects man 
with God, makes him feel that the good of 
others is his personal good, assures him of a 
future life of retribution, and, by revealing his 
immortality, calms his passions. 

Gentlemen, I have addressed your under- 
standings, not your feelings. But the subject 
of Christianity is one which cannot be rightly 
apprehended without the strongest feeling ; not 
the transient excitement existing for an hour, 
and then forgotten, but a feeling possessing the 
whole heart, and governing our lives. Of the 
form of infidelity which we have been consid- 
ering, there can be but one opinion among hon- 
est men. Great moral offences in individuals 
are, indeed, commonly connected with the pe- 
culiar character of their age, and with a pre- 



OF INFIDELITY. 267 

vailing want of moral sentiment in regard to 
such offences in the community in which they 
are committed. This may be pleaded in ex- 
cuse for the individual; but the essential na- 
ture of the offence remains. It is a truth, 
which few among us will question, that for 
any one to pretend to be a Christian teacher, 
who disbelieves the divine origin and authority 
of Christianity, and would undermine the belief 
of others, is treachery towards God and man. 
If I were to address such a one, I would im- 
plore him by all his remaining self-respect, by 
his sense of common honesty, by his regard to 
the well-being of his fellow-men, by his fear of 
God, if he believe that there is a God, and by 
the awful realities of the future world, to stop 
short in his course ; and, if he cannot become 
a Christian, to cease to be a pretended Chris- 
tian teacher, and to assume his proper char- 
acter. 

If we have taken a correct view of the state 
of opinion throughout the world, you will per- 
ceive that it is a subject of very serious consid- 
eration, and of individual action, to all of us 
who have faith in Christianity, and especially 
to you. Gentlemen, who have devoted your- 
selves to the Christian ministry. Every motive 
that addresses the better part of our nature 



268 ON THE LATEST FORM OF INFIDELITY. 

urges you to be faithful in your office. A sin- 
cere moral purpose will strengthen your judg- 
ment and ability ; for he who has no object but 
to do right will not find it difficult to ascer- 
tain his duty, and the means of performing it. 
He who earnestly desires to serve his fellow- 
men is so strongly drawn toward the truth, 
as the essential means of human happiness, 
that he is not likely to be turned aside by any 
dangerous error. Our Saviour referred to no 
supernatural illumination when he said, "If 
any one is desirous to do the will of him who 
sent me, he will know concerning my doctrine, 
whether it be from God, or whether I speak 
from myself" What you believe and feel, it is 
the business of your lives, and this is a great 
privilege, to make others believe and feel. In 
the view of the worldly, the sphere of your du- 
ties may often appear humble ; but you will not 
on that account break through it to seek for no- 
toriety beyond. Deep and permanent feeling is 
very quiet and persevering. It cannot fail in 
its purposes. It cannot but communicate itself 
in some degree to others, and it is secure of the 
approbation of God. 



REMARKS 



ON THE 



MODERN GERMAN SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 



23 



REMARKS 



MODERN GERMAN SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 



When the preceding tract was first pub- 
lished, it was accompanied by a note with a 
title answering to that above given. This note 
I afterwards had occasion to illustrate and de- 
fend in a separate publication. But the char- 
acteristics and tendencies of German infidel 
philosophy have since been more fully devel- 
oped. It has thrown aside the veil of pre- 
tended Christianity. A visible process of dete- 
rioration has been going on ; and the efiects of 
that philosophy are now manifest, not only in 
every department of thought and literature, but 
in the political and moral condition of Ger- 
many, 

In what follows, I have preserved, with great 
additions and changes, the illustrations which I 
formerly gave. The account thus formed may, 



272 THE MODERN GERMAN 

perhaps, possess some historical value, as afford- 
ing a general view of a state of transition from 
crude, unreasoning belief in traditionary relig- 
ious errors, to a virulent, unreasoning rejection 
of all religious truths. The aspects which the 
human mind assumed during this transition 
state are well worth the attention of him who 
is studying the causes and character of false 
opinions. During this period there was a rank 
growth of such opinions, of which the harvest 
is now gathering in. Our purpose will confine 
our attention principally to those concerning 
religion; but they spread through every de- 
partment of thought. 

"When I first wrote (about thirteen years 
ago), the school of theology on which I re- 
marked, with its peculiar characteristic, the 
attempt to amalgamate Antichristian opinions 
with Christian language, was still, apparently^ 
in full vigor. It had been gradually develop- 
ing itself and spreading for more than half a 
century. But it contained within itself a prin- 
ciple of decay. The partial disguising of opin* 
ions in unsuitable language ; the keeping up 
the show of a religious purpose in undermining 
the foundations of religion ; the making a dis- 
play of mystical feelings, and even of factitious 
enthusiasm, the cover of heartless unbelief; the 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 273 

ambiguous use of words and propositions in 
senses very different from their established 
meaning ; the seeming assertion on one page of 
what is contradicted on another; the playing 
fast and loose with the reader, — all this re- 
quired a certain degree of ingenuity, and pro- 
duced the impression of superior wisdom and 
insight in the writer. But the amalgamation 
attempted was impossible. One extravagance 
after another was put forth, till it became evi- 
dent that nothing new was to be said. It was 
a field in which no fresh reputation was to be 
gathered. Irreligion under this form had done 
its worst ; and absurdity could go no further. 
In Germany, therefore, this school of Anti- 
christian theology began rapidly to decline, from 
about the time when the preceding tract was 
written. Even the work on Christian Doc- 
trines (Christliche Glauhenslehre) by Strauss, 
published in 1840-41, cannot be considered 
as properly belonging to it, since that writer 
relinquishes all pretence of inculcating any 
religious truth. His book is a controversial 
attack on what he represents as being, or hav- 
ing been, the doctrines of Christianity, simply 
and thoroughly irreligious, without disguise. 
The barrier which the former infidel theology 
of Germany had imposed upon itself, formed 



274 THE MODERN GERMAN 

out of some remains of Christian faith and feel- 
ing, and the abuse of Christian language, has 
given way. In Germany the school has fallen 
into discredit ; and the boldest of its writers, 
and of their immediate successors, such as 
Strauss, are regarded by many with little re- 
spect, as men who busied themselves about ob- 
solete prejudices. 

In much of what follows, therefore, it has 
become proper to speak of that as past and his- 
torical, which but a few years ago might be 
spoken of as existing. The interest of the sub- 
ject, however, has not passed away. The cloud 
in which it was enveloped has been dispelled, 
and we now see distinctly the steps by which 
men, at the present day, may be conducted to 
the rejection of all religious belief. The pres- 
ent state of speculation in Germany — we 
cannot say of religion or philosophy — is the 
complement of the past; and they are to be 
viewed in their connection with each other. 
What exists now, removes all doubt concerning 
the essential character of what preceded and 
produced it. But out of Germany the change 
has not apparently been so great among the 
disciples of the German school. By many, the 
first stage, the stage of religious mysticism and 
of the abuse of religious language, has not yet 
been passed through. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 275 

The remarks which follow relate principal- 
ly to what, with reference to the distinction 
just made, may be called the introductory 
school of German infidel theology. As may 
appear from what has been said, the writers 
of this school are not to be confounded indis- 
criminately with those who have succeeded 
them. While it prevailed, the air was full of 
poisonous miasmata, but the worst symptoms 
of the pestilence they were breeding had not 
appeared. 

That infidelity should have taken for a dis- 
guise the name of Christianity is a remarkable 
phenomenon, which may be explained in part 
by the fact, that the principal leaders of the 
Antichristian school were placed in circumstan- 
ces in which the profession of Christianity was 
required, either by the nature of their ofiices, 
as professedly Christian teachers, or by a re- 
gard to decorum and their worldly interests. 
But they were surrounded by unbelief It had 
thoroughly pervaded the metaphysical philoso- 
phy of their country. It had been at work 
throughout the literature of Continental Eu- 
rope; and they had neither deep piety, nor 
moral strength, nor power of comprehension 
and reasoning, to resist its influence. Chris- 
tianity they abandoned to its enemies. They 



276 THE MODERN GERMAN 

joined those enemies. But it was necessary 
to have something that might be called Chris- 
tianity ; and they accordingly gave that name 
to multiform and unstable speculations of 
their own, unconnected with any established 
facts or principles; and in framing which it 
seems to have been forgotten, that what is pro- 
posed for belief requires some evidence of its 
truth. 

These speculations were favored by existing 
modes of thinking and writing. In rude times, 
when the mind is struggling with half-formed 
ideas, those claiming superior wisdom have 
usually affected an obscure, enigmatic, paradox- 
ical style, full of words and figures remote from 
the apprehension of the vulgar. Dark sayings 
are characteristic of one stage in the progress 
of the human intellect. The meaning which is 
not clearly understood by its propounder is 
thus sheltered from investigation, and his ora- 
cles are enabled to escape from confutation in 
the darkness. His teachings are magnified by 
mystery ; and the disciple thinks himself ini- 
tiated in some esoteric doctrine, too profound 
for common minds. Instead of the care with 
which a true philosopher endeavors to express 
real knowledge in the most perspicuous man- 
ner, there is a constant striving to disguise 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 277 

trivial, erroneous, and extravagant conceptions 
in unusual forms of language. 

The same phenomena are likely to occur 
whenever any great revolution takes place in 
men's opinions. In such seasons mysticism 
jflourishes. The mind loses its customary land- 
marks, distrusts its former belief, renounces its 
former guides, and, leaving the beaten path, 
becomes the bcAvildered follower of him who 
professes most boldly his acquaintance with the 
unexplored region on which it is entering. It 
is confused between new and old opinions, and 
sees nothing distinctly. "Words lose their for- 
mer meanings, and acquire no stable significa- 
tions instead; old errors and essential truths 
are abandoned in common, and paradoxical 
novelties are enunciated in a new language, 
understood neither by those who use nor by 
those who listen to it. 

I shall, therefore, in further pointing out 
some of the characteristics of the German in- 
fidel school of theology, hegin hy remarking on 
confusion of thought and unmeaning language^ 
connected with the theory, that Christian faith 
has its origin in the miiid itself independently of 
the Christian revelation, and with the denial of 
the truths of religion, 

24 



278 THE MODERN GERMAN 

These characteristics will be apparent 
throughout the passages which I shall have 
occasion to quote or refer to, but may be first 
illustrated from the writings of De Wette. 
Perhaps no theologian of the German school 
had more direct influence on opinion out of 
Germany, though this influence was some- 
what disproportioned, I belieye, to his reputa- 
tion among his countrymen. He is, however, 
a fair, or, rather, a favorable representative of 
the school. One of his last publications on 
the theory of religion appeared in 1834, in a 
theological journal.* It is a review of a work 
in defence of the genuineness of the writings of 
the New Testament.f Its purpose is to show 
that, as regards establishing the truth of Chris- 
tianity, all works of this kind are equally un- 
necessary and fruitless. A Christian's faith, 
according to him, is not to be founded on rea- 
soning. It is the result of intuition, of a con- 
sciousness of the truths of religion ; and cer- 
tainty is therefore of its essence. But reason 
deals with probabilities, and can aff'ord no cer- 
tainty. In this article he gives a professed ex- 

* " Theologische Studien und Kritiken," edited by Ullmann 
and Umbreit. 

I " Nachweis der Echtheit sammtlicher Schriften des N. T.,'* 
by Olshausen. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 279 

position of what he calls the " New Theology," 
which it had been the main purpose of his the- 
ological life to establish. It might be sup- 
posed that he must have reflected much on the 
subject, and have been able to give an intelli-^ 
gible exposition of it. 

" The greatest and most pregnant idea of the 
New Theology," he says, " and one the estab- 
lishment of which is the main business of my 
theological life, is, that the doctrine of faith 
must contain no metaphysics, or at least only so 
much as is necessary for a clear understanding 
of the faith ; that its essence is not in scientific 
propositions, but in the pious consciousness sci- 
entifically purified and enlightened." * 

The shadowy and shapeless meaning of the 
sentence I have quoted escapes in any attempt 
to grasp it. But this fact may not be univer- 
sally admitted. He whose own conceptions are 
vague and inconsistent is not sensible of the 
want of definiteness or meaning in what he 

* " Es ist die grosste und fruchtbarste Idee der neuern Theolo- 
gie (und deren Geltendmachung ist die Hauptaufgabe meines the- 
ologischen Lebens), dass die Glaubenslehre keine Metaphysik 
oder doch nur soviel davon enthalten darf, als zur klaren Verstand- 
igung des Glaubens nothig ist, dass ihr Wesen nicht in wissen- 
schaftlichen Satzen, sondern in dem wissenschaftlich gereinigten 
und erleachteten frommen Bewusstseyn besleht." — Tlieologische 
Sludien und Kritikeriy first number for 1834, p. 137. 



280 THE MODERN GERMAN 

reads. He attaches some unformed notions to 
words that in fact convey no coherent ideas; 
and may regard himself in consequence as a 
profound thinker, able to discover a meaning 
which less wise men cannot see. 

Let us examine the passage more carefully. 
Giving to the particular words any sense which 
we can suppose to have been intended, no com- 
prehensible meaning can be disentangled from 
them. 

" The doctrine of faith " (that is to say, what 
is proposed for religious belief) " must contain 
no metaphysics, or at least only so much as is 
necessary for a clear understanding of the faith": 

— We can ascribe no sense to any of these 
words but their obvious one ; and, this being 
the case, there is no intelligible meaning in the 
proposition. All the objects of religious faith, 

— God, the human soul, the spiritual world, 
the principles of moral action, — and every 
other, with all the questions that arise concern- 
ing them, belong to the province of metaphys- 
ical science. The proposition with its conclud- 
ing qualification is equally without meaning, as 
if one were to say, that a geologist, in explain- 
ing his doctrine concerning the changes which 
the earth has undergone, should introduce no 
physical ideas, or introduce them only so far as 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 281 

is necessary to a clear understanding of his the- 
ory. The word " metaphysics " seems to have 
been used with no regard to its proper mean- 
ing, but only in reference to the accidental and 
false associations which it may carry with it, — 
associations, natural enough in the mind of a 
German scholar, of something adverse to the 
common sentiments of men, enveloped in bar- 
barous terms of science, which seem used to 
mystify, not to explain, — something crabbed, 
obscure, and unintelligible; whereas the true 
science of metaphysics is only good sense ap- 
plied to the highest objects of thought ; and 
good sense is always intelligible. 

But to proceed. — " The essence of the doc- 
trine of faith " (that is, what is essential in the 
doctrines of religion) " does not consist in sci- 
entific propositions " : — Every faith, or belief, 
however attained, consists in the belief of 
truths, real or supposed ; and these real or 
supposed truths are to be expressed in words ; 
and these words form propositions. Every doc- 
trine is a proposition, — or a number of propo- 
sitions, that is, if the word " doctrine " be used 
in the singular to denote a body of doctrines. 
If the sentence, therefore, have any meaning, 
it must depend entirely on the word "scien- 
tific." 

24* 



282 THE MODERN GERMAN 

But science is only knowledge, or what is 
believed to be knowledge, digested into a sys- 
tem. A scientific proposition is a proposition 
making part of such a system, one connected 
with and confirmed by other propositions sup- 
posed to be true. It is asserted, then, that 
what is essential in religious belief does not 
consist of propositions, that is of truths, having 
any such relation to each other as to admit of 
their being arranged into a coherent system. 
This is what is actually asserted ; what was in 
the mind of the writer, when putting forth this 
assertion, cannot be conjectured with any confi- 
dence. 

So far from consisting in scientific proposi- 
tions, " the essence of the doctrine of faith con- 
sists in the pious consciousness " : — The " es- 
sence of the doctrine of faith " must mean the 
essential truths which are the objects of faith. 
What is affirmed, therefore, is, that those truths 
consist in " the pious consciousness," — namely, 
of those truths. It is evident that words can- 
not be put together more illogically with any 
show of meaning. One may conjecture some- 
thing of the intended purpose of the writer, not 
from what he here says, but from the theory 
which he elsewhere maintains. This theory, as 
I have before said, is, that the truths of religion 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 283 

are directly apprehended as such by the mind 
through a faculty which he sometimes calls con- 
sciousness, sometimes presentiment,"* and some- 
times feeling. With this imaginary faculty of 
apprehending these truths he confounds the 
truths themselves. The indistinct meaning 
which he had in mind was, I suppose, some- 
thing like this, — that what is properly to be 
called religious faith does not rest on truths 
which may be proved through the exercise of 
reason, but consists in a faculty of the mind 
through which the truths of religion are intui- 
tively discerned. 

" The essence of the doctrine of faith con- 

* '* Ahnung-," presentiment: — As used for a scientific temo, 
Krug (in his Dictionary of Philosophy) states it to mean, " the 
idea of an object which has not yet entered the consciousness with 
clearness, but which is beginning to approach it," — die Vor- 
stellung eines Gegenstandes, der noch nicht mit Klarheit in die 
Bewusstsein getreten ist, sich aber demselben schon zu nahern be- 
ginnt. I suppose that, in strictness, the word denotes a pretended 
faculty of perceiving such ideas, rather than the ideas themselves. 
It seems meant to express " a dim premonitory consciousness of a 
truth before it is clearly discerned." 

Apparently this conception was introduced into the new theol- 
ogy from the philosophy of Epicurus, who rested his belief in the 
existence of the gods, according to his idea of them, on what he 
calls the " anticipation " {aniicipatio, npoK-qyl/Ls) of them in the hu- 
man mind, the preexisting notion of them [proinotio), — existing 
before instruction, and common to every nation and every class of 
men. (Cicero, De Natural Deorum, Lib. I. ^^ 16, 17.) 



284 THE MODERN GERMAN 

sists," that is, the essential truths which are the 
objects of religious faith consist in " the pious 
consciousness, scientifically purified and enlight- 
ened " : — We may translate this proposition 
into words that apparently express its intended 
meaning thus : — The mind when in a pious 
state has intuitions, or is conscious of certain 
ideas, which, when scientifically purified and 
enlightened, become the truths of religion. 
Certainly, men in a pious state of mind have 
religious conceptions and feelings. But this 
unquestionable fact afibrds no support for a 
new theory concerning the grounds of belief in 
religion. According to the theory under con- 
sideration, the only proper and secure ground 
of belief in religion is consciousness of its 
truths. Consciousness is absolute certainty. 
To qualify it with the epithet " pious," as if 
something more than simple consciousness were 
necessary, shows a confusion of mind in which 
the writer did not discern his own meaning. 
But it must be not only pious, it must be sci- 
entifically purified and enlightened. It ap- 
pears, then, that consciousness, or intuition, 
our only source of certain knowledge, requires 
to be corrected and modified by some other 
knowledge digested into a science. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 285 

Such is the account which was given by one 
of the most conspicuous teachers of German 
theology, of the doctrine which it had been the 
main purpose of his theological life to explain 
and defend. But I have not quoted the pas- 
sage for the sake of illustrating De Wette's char- 
acter as a writer, but for the more general pur- 
pose of illustrating the prevailing character of 
modern German works of speculation. Every- 
where in these writings we find like confusion 
of thought, and a similar unintelligible use of 
language. Propositions are so vaguely ex- 
pressed, as to present no meaning on which the 
mind can rest. We read on in the hope that 
what follows may afford an explanation of the 
intended sense; but what follows, instead of 
throwing light on what we have gone over, is 
itself involved in equal obscurity. It is like 
pursuing a pretended algebraic process, in w^hich 
the value of an unknown term in one equation 
is to be determined by the value of another 
equally unknown in the equation which suc- 
ceeds, and so on to the end. 

But this sort of writing is of great antiquity, 
has been very prevalent, and finds many admir- 
ers, who are struck with wonder at the marvels 
which may be produced by the abuse of words. 
It consists not merely in putting together words 



286 THE MODERN GERMAN 

whose sense is known in such a manner that 
nothing intelligible is the result of the combi- 
nation; but in employing words, often newly 
fashioned, or newly applied, with undefined and 
undefinable meanings, — familiar words with 
senses new and old which are confused togeth- 
er, — and many-sided words, of which some- 
times one and sometimes another aspect is pre- 
sented to the reader. 

In the German language, the significations 
of many words are more unsteady and uncer- 
tain than in our own, or in the Southern lan- 
guages of Europe. Their outline is undefined 
and varying. Words have not been determined 
to precise meanings by habits of accurate usage 
and associations long connected with them. 
They do not, equally as with us, when stand- 
ing in certain relations to other words and 
ideas, present invariably and instantaneously 
the true sense required by the connection. 
The associations and implications connected 
with one signification of a word become con- 
fused with those connected with another ; and 
even significations widely distinct are con- 
founded together. Thus, to illustrate by an 
example, the same German word, Wunder, sig- 
nifies either a miracle, or merely a wonder, " a 
wonderful natural object or event " ; and the 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 287 

rejection of the miraculous character of Chris- 
tianity has doubtless been facilitated by the 
ease with which the mind may pass from one 
of those opposite meanings to the other, on 
account of their being both expressed by the 
same word. So, likewise, the word Glauhe de- 
notes at once faith^ religious faith, and beliefs 
that is, the belief of any supposed truth what- 
ever, and more especially the belief of self- 
evident or intuitive propositions ; and, together 
with this, it is used to denote also an imagi- 
nary faculty by which we assent to such prop- 
ositions, which have been called " the con- 
victions of pure reason." Hence has fol- 
lowed great confusion of thought. I will give 
one example more from the science of met- 
aphysics. Each of the German w^ords sinnlich 
and sensual — the latter of which almost seems 
to have been adopted into the language for the 
sake of the equivoque — combines the mean- 
ings of " sensible," that is, belonging to or per- 
ceptible by the senses, and of " sensual." It 
has been attempted to introduce into our lan- 
guage the barbarism of using " sensual " as if 
it meant sensible, or founded on the senses ; 
and hence, through a series of errors, we have 
heard of the sensual philosophy of Locke, — an 
epithet which from its associations is so utterly 



288 THE MODERN GERMAN 

inappropriate, that, even if it had the meaning^ 
given it, good sense and good taste would for- 
bid its use. As I have elsewhere remarked, 
almost all the words expressive of religious 
ideas have had a new sense put upon them, in 
which they are familiarly used.* The abuse 
has made inroads into our own language, and 
thus it has become necessary jealously to guard 
it, or its whole meaning in the higher depart- 
ments of thought will be broken down, the cul- 
tivation and growth of centuries will be de- 
stroyed, and it will be reduced to a waste in 
which the wildest speculations may flourish. 

Of words which have been used without any 
definite or settled meaning we have a notable 
example in the passage quoted from De Wette. 
It is the word " consciousness," Bewusstseyn, 
The German word has a nebulous meaning, of 
which that of " consciousness " forms only the 
nucleus. " Consciousness " in our language 
denotes a " knowledge of what passes in one's 
own mind " ; f or a knowledge of the present 
state of one's own mind. It carries with it the 
idea of absolute certainty. This is its only 
proper meaning. But the German word. Be- 
wiisstseyn^ comprehends the sense of " percep- 

* See the preceding tract, p. 240. \ Locke and Johnson. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 289 

tion " in its metaphysical use, of " sentiment " 
considered as a judgment founded on or con- 
nected with feeling, and of " imagination " op- 
erating to produce belief more or less distinct, 
as when it becomes synonymous with Ahnung, 
" presentiment." In theology it has been used, 
as we have seen, to denote an imaginary fac- 
ulty of directly apprehending the facts of relig- 
ion as such, or, to use another term, the sup- 
posed apperception of those facts. It is not 
here the place to speak of its vague use in pop- 
ular language, in which it has become almost a 
cant word, often occurring with a meaning only 
to be conjectured. But to all the senses that 
have been expressly mentioned, the idea of cer- 
tainty which belongs only to its proper signifi- 
cation has continued attached, and those senses 
with this false association have, through the in- 
fluence of German speculations and phraseol- 
ogy, been transferred into our own language 
and given to the word " consciousness." In 
further explaining the subject I must continue 
to use this word as the representative of the 
German Bewusstseyn, 

The history of its introduction to its present 
use as a theological term is given by the eccle- 
siastical historian Neander in a discourse deliv- 
ered by him (in 1839) before the University at 

25 



290 THE MODERN GERMAN 

Berlin in commemoration of the institution of 
the Protestant Church in the Mark of Bran- 
denburg.* He represents the religion taught 
by the Keformers as " pervading the minds of 
men, and producing among the people a cer- 
tain common consciousness of Christian truth," 
which is " the witness of Christian truth." 
" The name I use," he says, " Christian con- 
sciousness^ is indeed new ; and to have formed 
it in correspondence with the nature of the sub- 
ject, and to have introduced it into common 
use, is not the least among the great merits of 
the sainted Schleiermacher, whom we reverence 
as the teacher of Germany." He quotes the 
words of his colleague Steffens, who had said : 
" There are expressions which in themselves 
have a great historical significance." By the 
introduction of this term, " it was as if through 
Schleiermacher the conception which all men 
were seeking suddenly became clear to all, 
as if he had found out the right word of the 
riddle." 

What the riddle was is not explained, and I 
can offer no conjecture concerning it. But 
from this account it appears that its solution, 
the fortunate discovery of the mot d'a 



Commentatio de Georgio Vicelio. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 291 

•" consciousness," had for a time the happy ef- 
fect of composing religious diiferences in Ger- 
many and bringing men to an agreement in its 
use. This agreement in the use of the word 
— in a great variety of senses — has continued 
at least till a very late period ; but the other 
good effect of its introduction has not been last- 
ing. According to Neander, "Christian con- 
sciousness " signifies " a consciousness of Chris- 
tian truth " which is " the witness of Christian 
truth " ; that is, an intuitive knowledge of those 
facts which concern man as an immortal being, 
and of which it has been supposed that no as- 
surance can be obtained except through the 
revelation by which God has made them known. 
The existence of this form of intuition, hereto- 
fore unknown, should have been proved before 
so much importance was attached to it. What 
it attests as Christian truth should have been 
defined. According to Neander, it bore testi- 
mony to the doctrines of the early Reformers, 
especially of Luther, and was the occasion of 
their rapid spread. If this were its true office, 
it must have lost much of its efficacy in modern 
days. 

However that may be, the doctrine of the 
new theology was, that on consciousness, on the 
intuitive perception of the facts of religion, 



292 THE MODERN GERMAN 

Christian faith rests as its only sure foundation, 
or is identical with it. " Faith, as such," says 
De Wette, " is free from doubt. If connected 
with doubts, how could it produce resolutions, 
afford consolation] Resolution as such, conso- 
lation which is real, are both directly opposed 
to doubt and to the deliberation which is ever 
more or less connected with it, and exclude 
them, or, more correctly, presuppose that they 
are never in a state to shake the feeling 
of faith." * Whatever else may be thought 
of these sentences as rendered into English, 
they are perhaps sufficiently intelligible in re- 
spect to the point for which I have quoted 
them. 

" Faith, as such, is free from doubt " : — We 
cannot suppose that in these words, which are 
the foundation of all that follows, nothing more 
was meant than to assert the truism, that per- 
fect faith or belief on any subject excludes all 
doubt; or to maintain that a Christian may 
and should, through the exercise of his reason, 
attain full assurance of the truth of his relig- 
ion. Neither proposition can afford any ground 
for a new theory of religion. The meaning 
intended is, that religious faith, as such, is 

* Article before quoted, p. 136. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 293 

intuitive certainty; and the purpose of what 
follows is to maintain, that what may be called 
faith, or religious belief, is not true faith, un- 
less it possess this essential characteristic. 

The doctrine that the mind possesses a fac- 
ulty of intuitively discerning the truths of re- 
ligion is not only utterly untenable, but the 
proposition is of such a character, that it cannot 
well bear the test of being distinctly stated. It 
is the fundamental proposition to be maintained 
in those speculations, the end of which is to set 
aside equally the exercise of our reason and 
the authority of God's revelation, as the foun- 
dation of our religious belief; yet its defenders 
shrink from presenting it in broad daylight. 
They are disposed to keep it out of view behind 
a cloud of words. The question respecting the 
existence of such a faculty is not difficult to be 
decided. We are not conscious of possessing 
any such faculty; and there can be no other 
proof of its existence. We are conscious that 
we possess no such faculty ; and there can be no 
more conclusive proof of its non-existence. It 
is unnecessary in strict reasoning to add any 
thing more. The bubble which has been blown 
up into so glittering a theory, with such change- 
able colors, bursts at the first touch of truth. 

But much more may be added. An error 

25* 



294 THE MODERN GERMAN 

which has taken possession of the mind, espe- 
cially an error which has no foundation in rea- 
son, and consequently has never been subjected 
to the test of reason, can hardly be dislodged 
by a single argument, however decisive. Let 
us then go on a little further. Consciousness 
or intuition can inform us of nothing but what 
exists in our own minds, including the relations 
of our own ideas. It has no cognizance of ex- 
ternal facts. It is, therefore, not an intelligible 
error, but a mere absurdity, to maintain that 
we are conscious, or have an intuitive knowl- 
edge, of the being of God, of our own immor- 
tality, of the revelation of God through Christ, 
or of any other fact of religion. 

That such a faculty belongs to the human 
mind, that men have within them such a s'ure 
guide to religious truth, is a doctrine that stands 
in direct opposition to the whole history of the 
working of men's minds on the subject of re- 
ligion, — to our knowledge of the gross igno- 
rance and of the degrading superstitions that 
have prevailed throughout the world, and are 
still conspicuous in every part of it. But the 
doctrine, or some one equivalent, has flourished 
amid all the confusion of opposing creeds. The 
claim to a power, natural or supernatural, en- 
abling its possessor clearly to discern the truth 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 295 

without the exercise of reason, has been made 
with equal confidence by men asserting contra- 
dictory errors. It is not an invention of mod- 
ern times, though the application which has 
been made of it may be novel. In maintaining 
error, it is an obvious, and often the only plau- 
sible course, to confront reason with a claim to 
infallibility. 

One point remains, not important as an argu- 
ment against this imaginary faculty, but deserv- 
ing attention as illustrating the character of 
German speculation. De Wette, in the Intro- 
duction to his "Manual of Christian Doc- 
trines," * treats of the essential character of re- 
ligion, and lays down the elements of his sys- 
tem. His purpose is to show, that religious 
ideas arise in the mind through a process of 
self-development. After giving an account of 
this process he says : " God, freedom [man's 
freedom in action], and immortality cannot be 
proved, but only shown to be necessary ideas in 
[of] the reason." f 

" The truths of religion cannot be proved " : — 
No attempt, therefore, is made to prove them. 
That ideas or conceptions of the objects of re- 

* " Lehrbuch der christlichen Dogmatik." 
t Vol. I. p. 9, 3d ed. 



296 THE MODERN GERMAN 

ligion arise in the mind from any cause what- 
ever, supposing that they do so arise, is no evi- 
dence of the real existence of those objects. 
We cannot argue from the former fact to the 
latter, in this any more than in any analogous 
case. We might as rationally infer the exist- 
ence of fairies and mermaids from the existence 
of our ideas concerning them, or that of the 
gods of Epicurus from the " presentiment " of 
the Epicureans, or the reality of the objects of 
Grecian or Hindu mythology from the concep- 
tions of them developed in the minds of the 
Greeks or Hindus. 

" The truths of religion cannot be proved " : — 
What is meant by this 1 A truth is proved of 
v^hich v^e have sufficient evidence. For the 
truths of religion, according to the theory v^e 
are considering, we have the evidence of con- 
sciousness, and what evidence can be more de- 
cisive 1 Is it supposed that, while we have an 
undoubting belief through our consciousness, 
the understanding may remain unconvinced 1 
There is no hope of finding meaning or cohe- 
rence in a doctrine which rests on such irrecon- 
cilable propositions. 

" The truths of religion cannot be proved " : — 
This aspect of the theory has been recognized 
by many of its disciples. They have, in conse- 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 297 

quence, been inclined to consider religious faith 
as an act of the will. The truths of religion, 
according to them, are to be discerned only by 
the ^^ pious " consciousness. They are addressed, 
not to the understanding, but to the heart. 
They are not subjects for examination and rea- 
soning, but objects of feeling. They are to be 
received with childlike docility. The state of 
mind insisted upon as requisite for their admis- 
sion may bring to one's recollection the exhor- 
tation of St. Paul : — "Be not, brothers, chil- 
dren in understanding ; be as free from malice 
as children, but in understanding be men." * 

But it would have been strange, if even a 
German theorist had left his system so wholly 
unsupported as that of De Wette appears in 
the last quotation from him, and in the exposi- 
tions of many who may seem to have adopted it. 
He does not do so. In common with more or- 
thodox makers of religious systems, he provides 
it, in the absence of any help from reason, with 
supernatural aid. He says : — 

" Man, as we have seen, carries with him the 
germ of religion in the faculties of faith and pre- 
sentiment. We may call this a natural capacity, 
since it certainly falls into the series of the in- 

* 1 Corinthians xiv. 20. 



298 THE MODERN GERMAN 

ner phenomena, and belongs to the inner nature, 
but more properly a supernatural gift of God^ 
since it is the highest of all inner phenomena, 
placed above all arbitrary will of men, and pro- 
claims itself to be a property of our self-subsist- 
ent, eternal essence. We discern (ahnen) in it 
a spark of the divine spirit, for God in his rela- 
tion to nature is first to be discerned by us in 
our own nature. We call this the inner divine 
revelation." * 

Through the mockery of meaning which this 
passage presents, we discover what may be con- 
sidered as a final account of the words " faith," 
" presentiment," and consequently of their 
equivalent, " consciousness " ; namely, that they 
denote a supernatural faculty belonging to the 
human mind, which assures us of the truths of 
religion. Should any one holding the doctrine 
of Calvin respecting the natural inability of 
man to apprehend the truths of religion as 
such, maintain that, through special grace, he 
has supernatural assurance of those truths, we 
might easily believe him to understand himself 
and to think what he says ; but if one discuss- 
ing the subject, as a common man with com- 
mon men, assert that he has naturally a super- 

* Lehrbuch der christlichen Dogmatik, I. 20, 21. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 299 

natural assurance of any truth whatever, the 
case may be regarded as one of those the symp- 
toms of which are not likely to be allayed by 
reasoning. Non 

" Sunt verba et voces, quibus hunc lenire dolorem 



According to De Wette, what are represented 
in history as revelations, so far as they have any 
title to that character, are manifestations of 
" the inner divine revelation," made by inspired 
individuals [Begeisterte), who are messengers 
of God. But such revelations have all been 
mixed with error, and what those individuals 
have taught is to be subjected to the test of the 
" inner divine revelation," and has no authority 
but what it derives from its accordance with 
it.* The connection between faith and histor- 
ical Christianity consists in the fact, that the 
influence and spirit of those truths which are 
internally perceived by faith were developed in 
Christ, the pattern or model man, who found- 
ed a community, to which he transmitted that 
influence and spirit, and in which they have 
continued to be developed. His history is 
properly no object of religious faith. No new- 
warranty of those truths is given by their hav- 

* Ibid. I. 26, 28, et seqq. 



300 THE MODERN GERMAN 

ing been taught by him. The earlier Chris- 
tians did not believe them for this reason.* 

* Speaking of the earliest times of Christianity, he says : " The 
warranty of these truths did not consist in their having been taught 
by Christ ; for how seldom does the Apostle Paul appeal to the 

declarations of Christ A properly historical knowledge and 

examination of what Christ may have taught belonged not at all to 
the conditions of the original Christian faith." The last sentence 
is distinguished as emphatic by the mode of printing in the origi- 
nal. See the article by De Wette, in the Theol. Studien und Kri- 
tikeriy pp. 143, 144. 

There are, according to De Wette, two things to be considered 
respecting Christ's teaching as recorded in the Gospels, — one, 
whether it is truly reported, the other, whether considered in itself 
it is true ; whether it " authenticates itself to the pious spirit as 
divine revelation." The latter consideration is wholly indepen- 
dent of the former. The truth contained in his teaching as report- 
ed, " whether Jesus taught it or not, carries its validity with it. 
Is the unity and holiness of God more true because Jesus pro- 
claimed it? * By no means. His name can as little add any thing 
to the truth of this conviction * as take any thing from it ; and 
had he denied it, we should not believe him." — TJeher Religiori 
und Theologie, 2d ed., p. 177. 

According to De Wette, our Saviour taught the unity and holi- 
ness of God, and these doctrines are to be received because they 
" authenticate themselves to the pious spirit." According to later 
and more advanced philosophers of the German school, he taught, 
or should have taught, pantheism, the doctrines of Spinoza or of 
Hegel, doctrines which commend themselves more effectually to 
the pious consciousness. If indeed he had anticipated Spinoza, 
Schleiermacher might have transferred to him the famous eulogv^^ 
(to be hereafter noticed) which he bestows on the latter. 

* It becomes necessary to observe, that here and elsewhere the 
translator is not responsible for the want of grammar, or the misuse 
of language. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 301 

The outline of his history is true ; but, as re- 
gards the accounts in the Gospels, there is 
much that is questionable, when critically ex- 
amined. These accounts are to be regarded 
morally and spiritually, rather than in their lit- 
eral meaning. They are to be viewed as sym- 
bolical of the ideal in religion, by which De 
Wette means the truths of religion as recog- 
nized by consciousness. Thus the accounts 
may have ideal truth without historical real- 
ity, and, apart from all inquiry into their au- 
thenticity, may serve for spiritual edification. 
The ascription of a symbolical character to the 
Gospel history is a characteristic of the specu- 
lations of De Wette, borrowed from Kant ; and, 
in adopting and applying this principle, he was 
one of the theologians, who prepared the way 
for the extravagances of Strauss. 

De Wette says, in a passage already quoted : — 
" Is the unity and holiness of God more true 
because Jesus proclaimed it % By no means." 
This assertion can have no bearing on the point 
which he is endeavoring to maintain, till it is 
converted into a general proposition, as fol- 
lows : — The truths of religion are not more 
true because they were taught by Christ. One 
may add, with De Wette, Certainly not ; — that 
is, he may do so if he is able to connect any 

26 



302 THE MODERN GERMAIN 

meaning with the expression of making a truth 
more true. But this assertion is not what is 
needed to confirm the doctrine which the writer 
is endeavoring to maintain. A very different 
one is required. It is, that no new evidence of 
the truths, or, to use another term, of the facts 
of religion, can be afforded by a revelation from 
God. It must be maintained, that we are al- 
ready fully possessed of evidence which, being 
conclusive in itself, annihilates the value of all 
other. Yet the futile sophism I have adverted 
to, that truth is not more true because it was 
taught by Christ, has been current ; though I 
do not recollect to have seen it put forth by an 
English writer of any note. 

On what ground, then, did these theorists 
contend that their doctrines were to be called 
Christianity ] -— for they insisted on retaining 
that name. It was this ; — according to them, 
their doctrines were the teachings of " the in- 
ner divine revelation " ; and with these teach- 
ings the doctrines of Christ, so far as they can 
be ascertained, may be considered as coincident. 
I say, so far as they can be ascertained ; for 
we are told, that " one finds himself entangled 
in great difficulties in attempting to ascertain 
the true doctrine of Jesus from the Gospels " ; 
that '• it is very differently and ambiguously re- 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 303 

ported by the Evangelists " ; that, " according 
to John, it was not the same as according to the 
first three Evangelists " ; — and that, in regard 
to his history as given in the Gospels, there are 
similar difficulties ; that " we find in it many 
contradictions, chasms, enigmas, and mysteries "; 
that "but few at the present day can receive 
the miracles as such, and that there is great 
difficulty in separating the miraculous aspect 
[of a relation] from the proper fact [which was 
the foundation of it], and in comprehending 
how the Apostles should have seen miracles 
where there were none " ; * that, " in sum, 
these pretended contemporary relations are 
very far from approving themselves as such by 
their internal character ; and that they trans- 

* I leave this sentence standing as translated from the first edi- 
tion of DeWette's work (page 151), which was published in 1815, 
not having the second, which appeared in 1821, at hand when I first 
wrote. In the second edition it reads thus : — " There are many of 
the marvels ( Wunder) related by them [the Evangelists], that but 
few now-a-days can receive as pure historical facts, and there is 
great difficulty in one's forming for himself a livhig, original view of 
them {eine lehendige urspriingliche Ansicht davon)y The words 
relating to the Apostles are omitted. It is apparent that in the ear- 
lier written of the two sentences the word Wunder denotes a mira- 
cle^ in the later written, a marvel, corresponding to the ambiguous 
meaning of the word before pointed out. A comparison of them to- 
gether, likewise illustrates the gradual progress from less to more 
open scepticism which characterized the theology of the times. 



304 THE MODERN GERMAN 

mit to us the history of Jesus in a form in 
which we cannot readily receive it." * 

Such was the relation of the new theology to 
Christianity, — a relation which aiForded no 
reasonable, nor even intelligible, motive for as- 
suming its name, or for representing the doc- 
trines taught by that theology as coincident 
with those of Christ. But the absurdity of 
calling the new theory by the name of Chris- 
tianity did not stop here. It was further pre- 
tended, that this theory alone furnished the in- 
ternal evidence of our religion in the testimony 
of consciousness, and that this was the only evi- 
dence on which it could rest. But this pre- 
tence of placing Christianity on unassailable 
ground, upon what was falsely called its inter- 
nal evidence, — this theory, that the facts which 
it reveals are directly perceived by the mind, — 
was utterly inconsistent with any belief in 
Christianity as a revelation from God. The 
language of religion has been so abused by the 
writers of this school, that it may be worth 
while to say that I use those words in their 
customary and proper sense. No rational man 
can suppose that God has miraculously revealed 
facts which the very constitution of our nature 
enables us directly to perceive. 

* De^Wette, Ueber Religion und Theologie, 2d ed., pp. 178, 179. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 305 

Some of the earlier English Deistical writers 
(Lord Herbert may be cited as an example), 
though repelled from Christianity by the errors 
which in their day were incorporated in the 
representations given of it, still maintained doc- 
trines which are essentially truths of religion, 
and consequently thus far coincident with the 
teaching of Christ. Had this been the case 
with the infidel theologians of Germany, there 
might have seemed to be some pretext for call- 
ing their systems by the name of Christianity. 
But such was not the case. Their doctrines 
on the most important subjects, the doctrines 
maintained by the most noted of their num- 
ber, were not in accordance with, but in oppo- 
sition to, the truths taught us by God through 
Christ. 

If there be any fact of which we are assured 
by revelation, it is that of man's capacity of at- 
taining an immortal existence. " I am the res- 
urrection and eternal life," * said our Saviour ; 
''whoever believes in me, though he die, shall 
live." On this truth the whole fabric of Chris- 
tianity rests. The doctrine of immortality was 
the foundation of all that he taught his disci- 

* 'H C<^r}, — which cannot properly be expressed in English but 
by the terms " eternal life," or " eternal blessedness." 
26* 



306 THE MODERN GERMAN 

pies, of all his presentations of duty, his exhor- 
tations, his encouragements, and his warnings. 
He draws no motives from merely earthly con- 
siderations. He does not speak as a merely 
human teacher. There is a single passage 
which may seem, at first sight, to form an ex- 
ception to these remarks ; but its seeming, not, 
I think, real incongruity, only serves to illus- 
trate more strongly the essential, distinguishing 
character of his teaching.* Without the belief 
of this doctrine there can be no religion ; — for 

* I refer to the passage, Luke xiv. 7-11, in which our Lord 
directs a guest to take the lowest seat at an entertainment, that 
when his inviter comes he may be told by him to go up higher, 
and may thus be honored in the presence of the other guests. 
This is not, I conceive, a literal direction. It is called by the 
Evangelist a " parable " ; and I am not aware that that name was 
ever applied to a simple precept or maxim of conduct to be under- 
stood literally. So to use it would be contrary to its etymology, 
which implies a comparison. 

The occasion and meaning of this parable may be thus ex- 
plained. Like many other parables of our Lord, it referred to, and 
was apparently suggested by, something immediately present. 
The Pharisees and Teachers of the Law were, doubtless, those 
who, after their fasbion, chose out the higher places at table. 
They likewise considered themselves as being, through their sanc- 
tity, entitled to the highest places in the kingdom of Heaven. 
The blessings of this kingdom are often spoken of under the figure 
of a feast, as they are in this chapter, in the fifteenth verse and what 
follows it. It was against the peculiar claim to those blessings 
which they thought themselves to possess, that the parable was, as 
I conceive, directed, — against their arrogance and presumption. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 307 

what can any truths of religion, any truths re- 
lating to the eternal and the unseen, concern 
the feelings and the conduct of beings whose 
existence is limited to a few years in this world 
of the senses 1 

What, then, was the doctrine of the new the- 
ology on this subject 1 De Wette, in his work 
" On Eeligion and Theology," treats of the soul 
and of " its immortality, or more correctly," as 
he says, " its eternity," — an eternity, as he ex- 
plains himself, having equal relation to the 
past and the future. Its nature can be appre- 
hended only by the consciousness, by " presen- 
timent " and " faith," not by the understanding. 
So apprehended, it appears free from all rela- 
tions to time and space, it " presents a living 
point of the eternal being." If he understood 
himself, and I understand him, he teaches that 
eternity is an essential attribute of the soul. 
The importance of conceiving of it as having 
no relation to time and space is strongly in- 
sisted upon, though it is not explained what 
meaning this can have, except that it does not 
exist anywhere, or during any time. Forget- 
ting his own precept, that the doctrine of faith 
must contain nothing metaphysical, or at least 
only so much as is necessary for its clear expla- 
nation, he involves the subject in the gross ob- 



308 THE MODERN GERMAN 

scurity of German transcendental philosophy. 
" The doctrme of Kant," he says, " concerning 
the subjectivity of the forms of time and space, 
is of immeasurable importance for the clear 
view of religion." This alone can free us from 
doubts concerning the eternity of the soul. 

But, upon emerging from this darkness, we 
find the propositions which concern this funda- 
mental truth of religion plainly expressed, or 
rather, I should say, with so much plainness 
that their bearing is quite intelligible. 

" The idea of a continuance after death," he 
says, " is very common," but " death destroys 
our temporal and local existence, and after it, 
therefore, our eternal being must pass out of 
space and time." " We must not imagine that 
after death we shall commence a new period of 
existence like the present, and still less, that we 
shall have a like, though more noble and splen- 
did, dwelling-place," " If we speak of the con- 
tinuance of the soul after death in time and 
space, we are compelled to inquire after its 
preexistence. For an existence a parte post 
supposes an existence a parte ante; and the 
latter presents even more difficulties than the 
former. Did we exist before birth, why have 
we no remembrance of it % And, if no con- 
sciousness of this state remain to us, how will 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 309 

a consciousness of our present earthly life re- 
main to us after death 1 And yet this is pre- 
cisely what the most of men are concerned 
about. They wish to take with them their 
consciousness, their remembrance of this life 
into the other. The pious man who has a clear 

understanding of his faith can only 

laugh at the solicitude about the consciousness, 
as we' should laugh at the child who should 
be afraid that when grown up it could no long- 
er play with dolls." " In death we shall lose 
this consciousness, which is only the growth 
of the world of the senses, and is connected 
with it, and shall receive instead a higher con- 
sciousness^ of which we have now no conception." 
" The idea of the immortality of the soul should 
as little serve for indicating to us in the pros- 
pect a compensation for this life when we are 
obliged to quit it, as for filling us with super- 
stitious hopes concerning a much happier life 

hereafter ; it should teach us to live here 

every moment in eternity, and to think and 
conduct ourselves worthily of it. And to that 
end we should not direct a curious or longing 
glance to what may await us after death, but, 
fixing our eyes steadily on death and on our 
perishable lot, and going forward to meet it 
calmly, find already here the eternal and un- 



310 THE MODERN GERMAN 

changeable, namely, in our own breasts, in the 
higher worth of our spiritual essence." * 

The concluding sentences of this extract af- 
ford a specimen of a common characteristic of 
writers of this class, — an attempt to connect 
the nobler feelings which true religion inspires 
with the doctrines that they have substituted in 
its place, — a sickly glimmering of sentiment 
that shows amid the surrounding darkness like 
the phosphoric light generated by corruption. 

Throughout the speculations of the new the- 
ology, as in what we have just quoted, we find 
the conception of the eternity of the soul dis- 
connected from the belief of the personal im- 
mortality of individual men, — an eternity in 
which the soul has undergone and will undergo 
a succession of essential changes. There has 
been current both in ancient and in modern 
times a vague notion that the same soul may 
pass through difi*erent states of existence, losing 
its consciousness and acquiring a new one at 
each transition, and thus form a succession of 
individuals, each with a distinct personality. 
But, in maintaining this doctrine, there has 
been no attempt to answer the question. What 
constitutes it the same soul ? Till this ques- 

* Ueber Religion und Theologie, pp. 20-26. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 311 

tion is answered, the doctrine is only a confii* 
sion of words without meaning. 

The soul of a man is the man himself It is 
the feeling, thinking, conscious being. What- 
ever may be affirmed of an individual as a per- 
ceptive, intelligent, conscious being may be af- 
firmed of his soul, — and nothing else. To 
maintain that the same soul may constitute a 
different individual, is equivalent to maintaining 
that an individual remaining the same may be- 
come another individual. It is possible, how- 
ever, as we have seen, for one to form an imag- 
ination, though not a rational conception, of his 
soul as existing separate from himself Pro- 
ceeding, therefore, on this imagination, we may 
ask. What personal interest can any one have 
in the future fate of this soul, which is not him- 
self] 

Such was the teaching of the new theology 
in opposition to that truth which it most con- 
cerns men to believe. The pretended religion 
of consciousness, of the feelings, and of " faith," 
tended directly to the destruction of all rational 
belief in religion, and of all true religious feel- 
ing and principle. Its tendency was obvious 
from the first, and soon became clearly devel- 
oped in its workings. It passed, by scarcely 
sensible degradations, into the grossest forms of 



312 THE MODERN GERMAN 

irreligion. In its earliest stages it connected 
itself with attacks on the credibility of the Gos- 
pels, and with the denial of the possibility of 
miracles. It even allied itself with the panthe- 
ism of Spinoza, and of the later German meta- 
physicians, the successors of Kant. Still talk- 
ing about Christianity, and still claiming to be 
a sort of religion, it made some show of itself in 
the works of such writers as Strauss ; — till at 
last this school of speculation has arrived at 
its final result in the abnegation of all religious 
principle, and the contempt of morality, which 
are the boast of many of those who form the 
party calling itself " Young Germany." 

The character of the new theology made 
itself manifest in its effects on the popular 
literature of Germany contemporary with it. 
Goethe was then its acknowledged head. His 
ideas of religion, as he professes in his autobi- 
ography, were derived essentially from the sys- 
tem of Spinoza, of whom early in life he was, 
as he says, " the enthusiastic disciple, and 
the most decided w^orshipper."* He professed 
himself to be a believer in the immortality of 
the soul ; — in what sense of those words we 

* Aus meinem Leben, Book XIV. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 313 

shall immediately see. I doubt much that in 
his writings one can find an unequivocal recog- 
nition of the truth of that doctrine in any sense 
whatever ; but his opinions are to be gathered 
from some records of his conversation preserved 
by Falk and Eckermann. According to Falk, 
on the day of Wieland's funeral, " there was a 
tone of solemnity in Goethe which one rarely 
witnessed" ; and " our conversation on this oc- 
casion turned on topics out of the sphere of the 
senses, which he generally avoided, if he did not 
regard them with contempt." Wieland's soul 
he conceived to be possessed of too high powers 
ever to perish. He gave his theory of souls, 
probably, I think, improvised for his admiring 
listener. Borrowing a term from Leibnitz, as 
one adapted to express the most simple form of 
being, he represented all souls as " monads," 
which monads, he taught, are the animating 
and formative principles of all that exists. 
There are monads of the sun and of the stars. 
" I should be little surprised," said Goethe, " if 
thousands of years hence I should meet with 
this AVieland as the monad of a world, as a star 
of the first magnitude." The monads are con- 
stantly transmigrating. " I am certain," he 
continued, " that as you see me here I have ex- 
isted a thousand times already, and I have good 

27 



314 THE MODERN GERMAN 

hope of coming back a thousand times more." 
The conception of the soul's retaining its per- 
sonality seems to be here excluded; though 
Goethe had said before, that " how much or 
how little of its personality* is worthy to en- 
dure, is a question and a point to be left to 
God." Of the monads some are powerful, and 
form the " monads of worlds, souls of worlds " ; 
others are weak, such as " monads of ants, souls 
of ants." " The more powerful draw into their 
sphere all that approaches them," — including 
weaker monads, — " and convert it into some- 
thing appertaining to themselves, as into a hu- 
man body, a plant, an animal, or, still higher, 
into a star." Inferior monads thus absorbed be- 
come monads of parts of the body formed, sub- 
ject to the chief monad. Thus there are mon- 
ads of the hands and fingers, which in playing 
on the piano-forte are compelled to labor for the 
gratification of the chief monad, not their own. 
The forms in which the monads clothe them- 
selves are often but imperfectly developed, and 
may be called larvcB. Such are the forms of the 

* Personlichkeit ; — not "individual existence," as rendered 
by Mrs. Austin ; — but the alteration is unimportant as regards the 
expression of any meaning ; for it is as much without meaning to 
speak of a partial preservation of individual existence, as to speak 
of personality as being partially retained. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY." 315 

lower animals. " The annihilation of a monad 
is not to be thought of; but the danger of its 
being intercepted by a more powerful, but at the 
same time a meaner monad, is a serious consid- 
eration," — an apprehension which, as Goethe 
says, his observation of nature, on which his 
whole speculation is professedly founded, could 
not enable him entirely to put aside. While 
thus speaking, he was interrupted by the re- 
peated barking of a dog in the street. He flew 
to the window, and called out : — " Take what 
shape you will, larva, you shall not master 
me ! " * 

This discourse of Goethe on the immortality 
of the soul was delivered when he was in a 
solemn and philosophical mood. The same 
cannot be said of another passage of his conver- 
sation preserved by Eckermann. This latter 
was occasioned by some mention of Tiedge's 
Urania, a religious poem. " I have had to suf- 
fer," he said, " not a little from Tiedge's Ura- 
nia; for there was a time w^hen nothing else 
was sung or declaimed. Wherever you went, 

* The lot to which the weaker monads or souls are exposed 
may remind one of Pope's description of some '• vile straw that 's 
blown about the streets " ; — 

" now loose, now fast, 
And carried off in some dog's tail at last." 



316 THE MODERN GERMAN 

y6u found the Urania upon every table. The 
Urania and immortality were the topics of every 
conversation. T would by no means dispense 
Vfith the happiness of believing in a future con- 
tinuance of being ; nay, I would say with Lo- 
renzo de' Medici, that all those are dead even 
for this life who hope for no other; but such 
incomprehensible things lie too far off to be- 
come an object of daily consideration and of 
speculation which confounds us. ..... I 

found stupid women, who were proud of be- 
lieving in immortality with Tiedge ; and I was 
obliged to submit to be examined by many of 
them on this point in a very conceited manner. 
But I scandalized them by saying I could be 
well content, that after the close of this life we 
should be blessed with another, but I would beg 
not to have there for companions any who had 
believed in it here. For in that case, what vex- 
ation would await me ! The pious would come 
round me and say, Were we not in the right? 
Did we not predict it ] Has it not happened ? 
And so there too I should be bored without end. 
— It is for the higher classes, and especially 
for women of quality, who have nothing to 
do, to busy themselves with ideas of immortal- 
ity. But an able man, who thinks that there 
is something to be done here, and who, there- 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 317 

fore, has every day to strive, to fight, and to 
work, leaves the future world to itself, and is 
active and useful in the present. Ideas of im- 
mortality, moreover, are for such as have not 
attained the best fortune here ; and I would 
wager that if the good Tiedge had had better 
luck, he would have had better thoughts." * 

The loose, disjointed talk of the passages I 
have quoted, the irreligious flippancy of the 
last, the ignorance or disregard of the actual 
condition of mankind, few of whom " attain the 
best fortune here," and the insensibility to the 
character and wants of. all who aim at some- 
thing better than leading an animal and world- 
ly life, were characteristic of Goethe, and 
through him infected that literature of which 
he was for a long time the central orb. It was 
a literature suited to the low state of society 
by which it was produced and admired, and to 
the wants and tastes of a people to whom any 
form of intellectual refinement in their own 
language was a novelty. It was a literature 
from which the influence of religion was ex- 
cluded. We may hardly at once comprehend 
how much is expressed by those words. But 

* Gesprache mit Goethe (2d ed., Leipsic, 1837), Vo]. I. pp. 
120-122. 

27* 



318 THE MODERN GERMAN 

with the conceptions derived from religion, as 
affecting thie heart or: the imagination, regard- 
ed either as true, or as what may fee true, are 
connected all that gives nobleness and moral 
beauty to the character of man, — all that is at 
once earnest, genuine, and disinterested in his 
affections toward his fellow-men, — the senti- 
ments which have their origin in his spiritual 
nature, and the motives which cannot be re- 
solved into natural impulses, or modifications 
of selfishness. To one who has withdrawn him- 
self from the influence of religion, the spiritual 
world is annihilated. Infinity and eternity be- 
come of no concern to him. His view is con- 
tracted to what lies about him in this world. 
All that is venerable and holy disappears ; and 
the substitute offered for it is what has been 
called "Hero Worship." Nothing true to our 
higher nature was to be expected from the lit- 
erature which excluded all consideration of our 
higher nature. It was of the earth, earthy. 

The influence of Goethe and of the literature 
to which he gave its tone may be inferred from 
the constituents of his character. He was a 
thoroughly selfish man ; seeking his own grat- 
ifications, and caring for others only as his fol- 
lowers, admirers, or patrons, as those who 
might in some way contribute to his celebrity, 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 319 

rank, or means of self-indulgence. He had, as 
appears from his autobiography, little feeling 
even for such as had been most foolishly or most 
improperly connected with him, except so far as 
the expression of their sufferings might annoy 
him. He was an Epicurean, not such as we 
may imagine Atticus, the friend of Cicero, or 
Epicurus himself in his little garden at Athens, 
but according to the less refined habits of a 
small German court. His admirer. Talk, tells 
us that he commonly avoided all conversation 
respecting " super-sensible " topics, " perfectly, - 
as Falk believed, " on principle, since, conform- 
ably to his natural inclinations, he preferred to 
confine himself to the present and to the lovely 
appearances which art and nature afi'ord to the 
eyes and the contemplation in spheres which 
are accessible to us." 

Goethe's view was confined to this world, 
and to its apparent interests. He did not re- 
gard men as spiritual beings. With such a 
character one cannot estimate nor understand 
what is morally excellent in others, nor the ca- 
pacity of such excellence. He cannot be wise 
in his knowledge of mankind, nor exercise a 
beneficial influence on his readers. He sees 
only a small part of human nature, and that 
the inferior part of it. He can neither deline- 



320 THE MODERN GERMAN 

ate it truly as it exists, nor contribute to its ad- 
vancement. Thus it is that the personages 
whom Goethe introduces into his works of fic- 
tion have no power over the sympathy of an 
honest mind. No one out of the class which 
he has influenced can feel an interest in the 
characters or the fate of Werther, or Wilhelm 
Meister, or Faust. His personages do not ap- 
pear as real, living beings, acting and speaking 
from natural motives, but as theatrical puppets 
moved by wires, whose voice is at once recog- 
nized as that of the prompter. The philosophy 
of life (as it has been called), which runs 
through his works, is baseless and vague ; often 
put forth with an oracular obscurity, which 
serves at once to impose on a credulous wor- 
shipper, and to veil from others what might 
appear to them as commonplaces, or niaiseries. 
In his writings there is no expression of gen- 
uine religious principle or sentiment. They 
contain much which is irreverent and profane ; 
though what bears this character is marked 
more by a pagan deadness of feeling, than by a 
spirit of hostility to religion. They recom- 
mend, directly or indirectly, nothing pure or 
high in morals, but are worldly, licentious, and 
indecent, often addressed to the coarser part of 
man*s nature, dealing with common notions of 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 821 

duty as belonging to a " sickly religiousness" 
(krdnkliche Religiositdt), and thus preparing 
the way, at least, for that school which has sig- 
nalized itself by teaching the doctrine of the 
" Emancipatioti of the Flesh," ^ -^ a doctrine 
the character of which is indicated by its name. 



* See in the Conversations-Lexikon der Gegenwart (1838) the 
article entitled Emancipation des Fleisches, By those who know 
the character of the writings of Henri Heine, the spirit of this arti- 
cle may be judged of from a remark of its writer, that " Heine was 
the first who decidedly uttered the Gospel of the Emancipation of 
the Flesh." 

In a book (" Uncle Tom's Cabin"), which, to the honor of our 
community, has been read by many thousands among us, it is said : — 
" The gift to appreciate and the sense to feel the finer shades and 
relations of moral things often seems an attribute [seem to be attri-^ 
butes] of those whose whole life shows a careless disregard of 
them. Hence, Moore, Byron, Goethe, often speak words more 
wisely descriptive of the true religious sefitiment, than another 
man whose whole life is governed by it." — On Moore and Byron 
I have no remark to make. In minds of a higher order, however 
bewildered or corrupted, the recognition of the higher nature of 
man is likely to show itself in some form or other ; but I am not 
aware of any such manifestations in the writings of Goethe ; — of 
any thing affecting or elevating as an expression of religious or 
moral sentiment. There is in his Faust what his admirers have 
called a " pregnant," " a sublime and celebrated passage," though 
at the same time describing it as altogether of a " pantheistical 
tendency and character,"* in which Goethe is supposed by them 
to express his own sentiments concerning the belief of a God. It 
is put into the mouth of Faust, as addressed by him to the poor, 
simple girl whom he had debauched through the instigation of 

* Falk's Goethe, p. 77. Characteristics of Goethe, I. 93, 267, 269. 



322 THE MODERN GERMAN 

His countrymen have complained of Goethe, 
that, in the fearful struggle in which Europe 
was engaged during his lifetime, he had no 
feeling for Germany, no patriotism ; that his 
voice was not heard. But the complaint should 
have been expressed in more general terms. 
His indifference to the condition of Germany 
was only a branch of his indifference to the 



Mephistopheles. Its doctrine is incongruous, being, first, that the 
name of God may be given to the incomprehensible power that sur- 
rounds us, and then that it may be given to the feeling which the 
contemplation of this power produces : — 

" Fill thy heart with it, large as it is, 

And when thou art wholly blest in the feeling, 
Then name it what thou wilt, 
Name it happiness, heart, love, God. 
I have no name for it, 
Feeling is all." 

Faust had just before, in a discourse with Mephistopheles, ex- 
pressed his feeling toward the unhappy woman in a very coarse 
manner : — 

" Nenne nicht das schone Weib ! 
Bring' die Begier zu ihrem sussen Leib 
Nicht wieder vor die halb verruckten Sinnen I " 

In the line, "Name it happiness, heart, love, God," instead of 
" love," another word is required to preserve consistency of mean- 
ing, — a word for which love is sometimes used as synonymous 
by writers of this class. 

In speaking of the opposite spirit with which different kinds of 
literature may be imbued, the book I have mentioned will furnish 
an example. One capable of estimating its merit will dwell little 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 323 



condition of the world, so long as it did not af- 
fect him. During the sack of Weimar, the 
French commander had a guard placed round 
his house.* 

Upon some occasion, when Falk was dis- 
coursing of Goethe, as " floating with sublime 
indifference above the sport of the world," Her- 
der interrupted him with a speech, which he 
has recorded, apparently without comprehend- 
on its imperfections and oversig-hts, though he may regret that 
toward the conclusion it is marred by incidents and characters such 
as belong to an ordinary novel, and not to the real picture of ac- 
tual life which is presented in far the greater part of the narrative. 
It is a work of uncommon power : but its power, though we may 
admire the genius shown in it, rests on the solid foundation of 
moral truth. The mind of the writer is guided by that strong 
sense of right and wrong which invigorates the intellect scarcely 
less than the aflfections. Her book is true to human nature in the 
manifold phases of it which she brings before us, and true in its 
presentation of human duties in their relation to the whole of man's 
existence, — true, to use her own words, to " a life which, once 
believed in, stands as a solemn, significant figure before the other- 
wise unmeaning ciphers of time." It belongs to a very different 
class of literature from any thing produced in the school of Goethe, 
— to one far nobler and more perceptive. 

* The same year (1806), induced by his "respect for the mor- 
al law of marriage," as one of his biographers says, he married in 
his fifty-seventh year a woman who had long been his mistress ; 
and, during the interval between the sack of Weimar and the ex- 
pulsion of Bonaparte from Germany, he gave his time to the study 
of natural science, especially to his work on optics, which was to 
overturn the theory of Newton, and to the composition of the most 
licentious of his novels, his " Elective Affinities." 



324 THE MODERN GERMAN 

ing its truth or its terrible severity : — " This 
is all very well. But whether a man should 
here mount to that region where pictured and 
real sufferings become the same to him, where 
he ceases to be a man, though not to be an 
artist, where the light only shines, but neither 
warms nor <|uickens, and whether these maxims, 
if received, would not produce a general depra- 
vation of character, — this is another question." 
He compares such men to Nero, who played on 
the lyre after setting fire to Eome, regarding it 
as a splendid picture, and pleased himself with 
tasteful designs for rebuilding it. "What did 
it concern Nero's architect that the tears of 
women and children were flowing in the burn- 
ing city? That is an old story. ..... We 

are artists, gods, Neros." * 

The philosophy of Germany gave still an- 
other character to the popular literature of 
Germany. It transferred to it its obscurity. 
In reading many works, equally in one depart- 
ment as the other, a mist seems to gather over 
our eyes. We discern strange appearances, but 
not with a distinct outline. Of this Goethe is 
again a prominent example. It was his pleas- 
ure to be regarded as a mysterious writer, full 

* Falk's Goethe, pp, 142-144. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 325 

of hidden meanings. He addressed the " pre- 
sentiment" rather than the understanding of 
his readers. Of Wilhelm Meister it is said by 
an admirer : — " What Goethe intended in it 
remains a mystery Nevertheless Meis- 
ter must ever be considered one of Goethe's 
most admirable works, for in that and in Faust 
are combined all the universality of his ge- 
nius." * Of Faust it is said : — " The mysteri- 
ous depth of this great poem, in which the 
world is reflected, gave occasion to many expla- 
nations differing from one another, and to the 
most opposite views ; and both mysticism and 
the contrary doctrine of Hegel were believed to 
be reproduced in it." f " Faust," said Goethe 
himself, " is altogether something incommensu- 
rable, and all attempts to bring it nearer to the 

understanding are vain But this very 

obscurity excites men, and they labor upon it, 
as upon all insolvable problems." { " We must 
not," says one of his reviewers, " look for Goe- 
the's life in his autobiography. His entire life 
is in his works. They are so many different 
reflexes of different states of his own outer and 
inner being He might have revealed 

* Characteristics of Goethe, III. 233, 234. 
f Conversations- Lexikon (1834), Art. Gijthe. 
X Eckermann, II. 170. 

28 



326 THE MODERN GERMAN 

himself more distinctly ; but mystery was with 
him the object of a sort of reverence, or the re- 
sult of a system." * His friend, Von Miiller, in 
a eulogy delivered upon him after his death, 
says : — " From his love of secrecy [in common 
affairs] proceeded his not less ruling inclination 
to the enigmatical, which not unfrequently is an 
obstacle to the enjoyment of his writings. This 
inclination formed itself in him into deliberate 
maxims. I have heard him often maintain, that 
a work of art, especially a poem, which leaves 
nothing to divine, is not a true work, is nothing 
thoroughly worthy ; that its highest purpose 
ever is to rouse to reflection ; and that it can 
become truly a favorite with the spectator or 
reader only when it forces him to interpret it 
according to his own mode of thinking, and, as 
it were, to complete and make it over again." "j* 
Hence Goethe has been called " the most 
suggestive of writers." A suggestive writer is 
one who presents some important truth in a 
clear light, which is reflected from other truths 
connected with it, and brings them into view; 
not one who perplexes his readers by involving 
them in attempts to solve his meaning, or to de- 

* Characteristics of Goethe, III. 40. 

f Goethe in seiner ethischen Eigenthiimlichkeit (1832), p. 19. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 327 

termine whether he has any. Suggestions give 
light, not darkness. A suggestive writer con- 
ducts us to a point of view from which we can 
see what was before hidden from us, without its 
being expressly pointed out by him. A writer 
who has a strong tendency to the enigmatical 
carries us upon a barren heath where different 
footpaths present themselves, and suggests that 
one or other may lead us right. The affectation 
of profoundness is a common disguise of pov- 
erty or want of thought. 

Among the evils of which the German school 
of speculation has been at once the sign and the 
cause, unintelligible writing, if not one of the 
greatest, has been one of the most obvious. 
We find it in every form, — in professed works 
of disquisition, and in professed works of senti- 
ment, pervading masses of metaphysics, and 
spreading an uncertain light over immoral nov- 
els. This unmeaning use of language indi- 
cates and corresponds to great confusion of 
thought. It is one result of the want of settled 
principles, and of the anarchical and ever-vary- 
ing state of opinion, which are characteristics 
of our times. It affords no ready means of 
conviction; for it is hard to convince of error 
those who do not understand themselves, who 
are without any definite purpose but a negative 



328 THE MODERN GERMAN 

or destructive one, who have no distinct and 
fixed meaning, but whose pretended meaning 
disappears in proportion as you give an intelli- 
gible sense to the words which they use. Per- 
spicuity is the great enemy of error. Com- 
monly, a false opinion, when stated in plain 
words, either reveals its character, or can easily 
be shown to be what it is. When one is bewil- 
dered by obscurity of style, there is a strong 
presumption against the value of any meaning 
that may be put upon the words. He who 
writes what is worth reading must think clear- 
ly ; and it is a rare case that he who thinks 
clearly wants the ability to express himself in- 
telligibly. 

From a literature lying out of the light of re- 
ligion, all the sources of the highest beauty and 
interest were excluded ; all those belonging to 
our spiritual and more excellent nature. It 
was necessarily conversant with meaner objects, 
with the palpable and familiar things of vulgar 
life, with the ordinary passions of men, to which 
there is often an attempt to give interest by a 
strong seasoning of licentiousness, or by exag- 
geration and extravagance, or by exhibiting 
them in combinations which have no counter- 
part in nature. Hence followed a general de- 
pravation of taste, a confinement of its sphere, 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 329 

a belittling of its character. The terms of 
praise, terms which have passed into our own 
language, became the words " aesthetic " and 
" artistic," neither of them expressive of moral 
feeling, the first being used to signify very lit- 
tle or nothing more than " agreeable as a work 
of art," and the other denoting only the skill of 
the artist. A person very intimately connected 
with Goethe once remarked, that " he was not 
an artist ; for he was conscious of moral prefer- 
ences." The consequent deficiencies and ofien- 
ces in German literature have been such, that, 
though there are many translations from it into 
our own language, there are but few works 
which have secured the permanent regard of 
English readers.* 

* To attempt to illustrate these remarks by exemplifications 
would lead us much too far ; but I am induced to give one illustra- 
tion, which is to be found in the last chapter of the third edition of 
Strauss's noted work (it is omitted in the fourth edition), — espe- 
cially as the passage has a bearing on various topics which have 
been adverted to. Strauss, after laboring to show that there is 
very little to be credited in the history of our Lord, as all that is 
miraculous is to be unhesitatingly rejected, and to reduce him to 
little more than a mythical or allegorical personage, takes in this 
concluding chapter a new position, as being in some sort a Chris- 
tian, and asserts that Christ, as the founder of Christianity, ranks 
above the other founders of different religions. Such is the fact, 
he says, so far as regards the past ; but whether this superiority 
will continue is another question. In the discussion of it, which it 
28* 



330 THE MODERN GERMAN 

Thus we have seen something of the charac- 
ter and effects of German theology, connected 
as it was with German speculation on all relat- 
ed subjects. I use the epithet not invidiously, 
but because all its most distinguishing peculiar- 
ities, in matter and form, were fully developed 
in Germany, were not received there from 
abroad, but have made their way thence else- 
where. This they continue to do, even while 
they are dying out on their native soil, and 
leaving only their calamitous effects behind. I 
have spoken particularly of De Wette, not from 
any intellectual superiority on his part, but be- 
cause he is a favorable specimen of a large class 
of German theologians, and one of those best 
known out of Germany. But, excepting out 
of Germany, there are now, I believe, very few 

is not worth while to attempt to make intelligible, Strauss cites 
examples of great men, — such as Caesar and Bonaparte, — the 
earlier of whom in point of time have been excelled by the later, 
not through any superiority of individual qualities, but because 
their successors lived in a more advanced state of the world. Thus 
Shakspeare stands higher than Homer or Sophocles " because he 
wrought upon a more developed consciousness of humanity, and had 
to solve deeper, or, at least, more complicated problems ; — as 
again, in this same respect, Goethe is above Shakspeare." — Shak- 
speare and Goethe I The comparison is between Prospero, with 
his wand of power, controlling the spirits of the elements, and 
Mephistopheles drawing infernal wine by boring holes in a wooden 
table with a gimlet. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 331 

who would regard his name as any authority, 
or consult his works for guidance in regard to 
the character of religion. 

I SHALL now illustrate this theology still fur- 
ther from the most celebrated and popular 
work of one who was in his day, perhaps, the 
most distinguished of its leaders, though in the 
interval since his death, in 1834, his celeb- 
rity and influence among his countrymen have 
declined as rapidly as De Wette's. I mean 

SCHLEIERMACHER. 

It is now fifty-three years since Schleier- 
macher first published his " Discourses on Ee- 
ligion." * In a tone of pretension very foreign 

* "Ueber die Religion." — This work was originally published 
in 1799, when the author was thirty years old. In 1806, a second 
edition appeared, in the Dedication of which the author professes 
to have revised it throughout, for the purpose, among others, of 
removing all occasion for the gross misunderstandings to which it 
had been exposed, causing him to be represented as a fanatic by 
infidels, and an unbeliever by bigots. In 1821, a third edition was 
published, again revised, with many changes of expression, and ac- 
companied with copious notes, to explain more fully the writer's 
opinions. And in 1831, three years before his death, a fourth edi- 
tion was issued, being that which I use. In the Preface to the 
third edition (which is retained, without any additional notice, in 
the fourth), he again refers to " the numerous and in part very 
wonderful misconceptions " of his meaning, and to the consequent 



832 THE MODERN GERMAN 

from the common character of intelligent men, 
he professes to have written it, not *' through 
any determination of his judgment," but through 
" a divine call," a " heavenly impulse." It is a 
system of pantheism, wrought up in a highly 
declamatory style, in which the language often 
soars beyond meaning, and in which there is 
scarcely an attempt at what may be called rea- 
soning. Religion, according to him, is the 
sense of the union of the individual with the 
universe, with Nature, or, in the language of 
the sect, with the One and AIL* It is a feel- 
ing; it has nothing to do with belief or ac- 
tion ; f it is unconnected with morality ; their 
provinces are different ; J it is independent of 
the idea of a personal God. § The idea of a 
personal God is pure mythology. || And the 
belief and desire of personal immortality are 
" wholly irreligious," as being opposed to that 

charges of atheism and mysticism which had been brought against 
him " almost in the same breath." One would think that it must 
be felt as a great misfortune by a writer earnest to propagate what 
he thinks the truth concerning religion to be unable to express 
himself intelligibly, and, in consequence, to be grossly misappre- 
hended, and to be charged with unbelief and fanaticism, with athe- 
ism and mysticism. 

* See particularly pp. 48, seqq. 

t Pp. 53, 54. X Pp. 21, seqq. 

§Pp. 110, seqq. j| P. 59. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 333 

which is the aim of religion, " the annihilation 
of one's own personality," " the living in the 
One and All," " the becoming, as far as possi- 
ble, one with the universe." * The writer 
whom I have quoted partook of the sacrament 
on his death-bed, as a Christian. We may- 
have a striking apprehension of the relation in 
which his system stands to Christianity, if we 
imagine the words of Jesus struck out from the 
Gospels, and his teachings substituted in their 
stead. 

Schleiermacher introduces into his work a 
glowing eulogy on Spinoza. It is an elaborate 
specimen of his eloquence. " Reverently," he 
apostrophizes, " oifer with me a lock of hair to 
the manes of the holy, the proscribed Spinoza. 
Him the high World-spirit pervaded ; the infi- 
nite was his beginning and end, the universe 
his only and eternal love; in holy innocence 
and deep humility he beheld himself mirrored 
in the eternal world, and saw how he too was 
its loveliest mirror. Full of religion was he, 
and full of a holy spirit, and hence he stands 
alone and unapproached, master in his art, but 
raised above the profane fraternity, without ap- 
prentices and without burghership." f 

* Pp. 118, seqq. f Ueber die Religion, pp. 47, 48. 



334 THE MODERN GERMAN 

Cousin, who may be reckoned as belonging 
to the German school of metaphysicians and 
theologists, likewise pronounces a panegyric on 
Spinoza ; but it looks pale by the side of Schlei- 
ermacher's. I will quote a few sentences : — 
" The book of Spinoza, all bristling as it is after 
the fashion of his time with geometrical formu- 
Ise, — so dry and so repulsive in its style, — is at 
the bottom a mystic hymn, a soaring and long- 
ing of the spirit directed toward Him who alone 

is authorized to say, I am that I am 

Spinoza is an Indian yogi, a Persian sufi, an 
enthusiastic monk ; and the author whom this 
pretended atheist most resembles is the un- 
known author of the ' Imitation of Jesus 
Christ.' " * Elsewhere, however, he says that, 
according to the doctrine of Spinoza, " God can 
be only a substance, and not a cause, — the 
perfect being, infinite, necessary, the immuta- 
ble substance of the universe, and not its pro- 
ducing and creating cause." f This language is 
very inaccurate ; for Spinoza repeats often, that 
God is the only cause of all things, teaching as 
a fundamental doctrine that the " substance of 

* Fragments Philosophiques. CEuvres (Bruxelles, 1841), Tom. 
II. p. 178. 

f Cours de THistoire de la Philosophie, U""" Le^on. CEuvres, 
Tom. I. p. 218. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 335 

the universe," which alone has an independent 
existence, produces all finite beings as their im- 
manent cause, — that is, as I shall hereafter 
explain, produces them from itself. But he 
also teaches, as we shall likewise see, that this 
substance, or God, as it is called in his vocab- 
ulary, produces 'them without purpose, hav- 
ing no providence over them. The absurdity 
of supposing a mystic, devotional hymn, the 
enthusiastic breathing forth of the spirit, to be 
addressed to such a being either as Spinoza 
conceived of, or as Cousin reports him to have 
conceived of, is, perhaps, not aggravated by rep- 
resenting this hymn as composed in geometrical 
formulce^ whatever may be the meaning of those 
words. But this mistake is not the only fun- 
damental error respecting the system of Spino- 
za that appears in the passage from which I 
have last quoted. Cousin says, that " in Spino- 
za's philosophy man and nature are only pure 
phenomena, simple attributes of the only and 
absolute substance," and repeatedly uses the 
word " attribute " in a similar manner. But by 
an " attribute " Spinoza explains himself as 
meaning that which constitutes the essence of 
a substance. According to him, the only attri- 
butes of the one substance of the universe, his 
God, which are comprehensible by man, are in- 



336 THE MODERN GERMAN 

finite extension and infinite thought. These 
are not finite things ; man and nature are not 
these attributes, as Cousin asserts. But all 
finite things are, according to Spinoza, modes 
of these attributes. Between these modes 
which constitute finite things, and the attri- 
butes which constitute the infinite substance, 
Spinoza of course makes a wide distinction. 
Perhaps, however, the doctrine is no more an 
object of the understanding in its proper form, 
as it appears in Spinoza, than in that in which it 
is presented by Cousin. To illustrate the dif- 
ference between them by a particular example, — 
according to Cousin, the sun, a finite thing, is, 
in Spinoza's system, an attribute of God; ac- 
cording to Spinoza himself, it is a mode of infi- 
nite extension, which is one attribute of the 
universal substance ; for the other attribute, in- 
finite thought, is out of the question. 

Before the time when German speculation 
began to flourish, Spinoza had been almost for- 
gotten. His works had never been collected, 
and were separately difiicult to be procured. 
But in the last quarter of the last century his 
fame began to revive in Germany, it spread rap- 
idly, and his influence on German metaphysics 
and German infidel theology soon became very 
great, and generally recognized. Within four 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 337 

years after Schleiermacher's eulogy, Paulus, 
another German theologian of about equal 
note, published the first edition of his collected 
works (in 1802-3). In the preface to the sec- 
ond volume he says, that "the superstitious 
and ridiculous horror of the atheism, so called, 
of Spinoza, was shaken off by his countrymen 
earlier than by the intelligent elsewhere." To 
deny the atheism of Spinoza is merely to deny 
that the word is to be used in its common and 
established sense, as expressive of disbelief in 
an intelligent and designing Creator. 

In 1830 a writer named Gfrorer (I speak 
of him thus, because, though he has written 
much, I suppose his name is familiar to very 
few of my readers) put forth another edition of 
Spinoza's collected works; and in 1843 anoth- 
er cheap edition, edited by Bruder, was stereo- 
typed at the press of Tauchnitz. Gfrorer, in 
speaking of Spinoza, emulates the lofty tone 
of Schleiermacher. He says, among other 
things : — " Should you consider the force of 
his genius, you may scarce regard him as a 
man, but as some new nature, which by itself 
alone effected all which might be effected by 
the joint efforts of the forces of a thousand mor- 
tals. You might equal him to an age ; for dur- 
ing a period, now of almost two centuries, what 



338 THE MODERN GERMAN 

advance has been made in philosophy, in which 
he did not lead the way and break the road] 
or what improvement has there been in theol- 
ogy, which was not derived from his store- 
houses ] " * " In treating sacred history who 
was more acute, and more free from all the 
prejudices which his own age not only defend- 
ed, but madly cherished; so that to this day 
whatever sound doctrine has been promulgated 
on this subject appears to have had its source 
in the writings of Spinoza ] " j* " Spinoza 
maintained that the universe, or the eternity 
of the laws which operate in the world, is 
God ; and this doctrine very many aihrm to be 
most gloomy and horrible, as it seems to be in- 
consistent with Divine Providence and the spe- 
cial care and love of God for pious men. But 
let them consider how calm and how cheerful 

Spinoza always lived. And in truth 

nothing can be called gloomy or cheerful ex- 
cept under some particular relation, and it may 
well be, that what seems dreadful to one may 
be most agreeable to another who judges the 
thing differently." J 

"What is said in such passages concerning the 
atheistic, or, if any one prefer the word, panthe- 

* Prasfat. p. vi. f Ibid. p. viii. % Ibid. pp. ix., x. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 339 

istic, doctrine of Spinoza may be oiFensive to 
our feelings, but in the present state of opinion 
it is well they should be written. It is desir- 
able that the nature of the discussion with the 
later speculatists of Germany and those of the 
same school elsewhere should be distinctly and 
generally understood ; that it should be made as 
evident as it has been made, that the question 
at issue is, whether there is or is not any 
ground for the existence of religion among 
men. 

Bruder does not profess himself to be so en- 
thusiastic an admirer of Spinoza as some of 
those whom I have quoted. He mentions the 
declaration of Lessing, that " there is no other 
philosophy but the philosophy of Spinoza " ; 
he speaks of his influence on the principal Ger- 
man metaphysicians subsequent to Kant; he 
quotes at length Schleiermacher's eulogy upon 
him, and then remarks, that " it is not strange 
that at the present day, when there is the most 
eager discussion of philosophical subjects, and 
of the weightiest questions in politics and lit- 
erature, the philosophy of Spinoza should be 
brought forward and cultivated with new ardor 
as a primary source, and even that particular 
courses of lectures on his doctrine should be de- 
livered in some of the universities of our coun- 



340 THE MODERN GERMAN 

try." " The credit of Spinoza," he says, " be- 
gan to prevail when, in the beginning of the 
nineteenth century, Schelling and Hegel at last 
inclined to many of his opinions, each according 
to his own system, so that he may be account- 
ed the source of the philosophy of our age." * 

Such being the influence of Spinoza on mod- 
ern German metaphysics and theology, it is ne- 
cessary to a just conception of them to have 
some acquaintance with his leading doctrines, 
and his manner of thinking and writing. 

According to Spinoza there is but one sub- 
stance existing.f All the phenomena of what 

* Praefat. pp. iii., iv., xix. 

f To this substance Spinoza repeatedly ascribes " infinite attri- 
butes." In the sixth of the Definitions with which he commences 
his Ethics, he says : — " By God I understand an absolutely infi- 
nite being, that is, a substance consisting of infinite attributes." 
In the First Part of this work he speaks of all the attributes of 
God, and uses other expressions implying more than a duality of 
attributes. But one would not in consequence be justified in stat- 
ing that the ascription of infinite attributes to the one substance of 
the universe made a part of Spinoza's system. His language ap- 
pears to be used either through confusion of mind, or in accommo- 
dation to the common belief concerning the attributes of God, 
whose name he has transferred to the infinite substance. What- 
ever he may have asserted in general terms, Spinoza expressly 
states that but two attributes of this substance can be known by 
man, — one, infinite extension (extension being considered by him 
as the essence of matter), and the other, infinite thought (thought 
being considered by him as the essence of all thinking beings)^ 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 341 

we call the created universe — that is, all finite 
beings, with their properties, acts, and affec- 
tions ; with their moral qualities, good or bad ; 
with their joys and sufferings, — are but modes 
or modifications of the attributes of this sole 
substance, or, in other words, of this substance 
itself This substance has existed without be- 
ginning. It could be produced by no other ; 
for one substance cannot produce another ; — 
creation is impossible * It is " the immanent 
cause of all things, not a transitive cause." f 
These terms are technical, and require explana- 
tion. An immanent cause is that which produ- 
ces effects only in or upon itself. A transitive 
cause is that which passes out of itself, as it 
were, to produce, or to act on, something else.lj: 

These two attributes only are specified in his Ethics ; the consid- 
eration of these alone, with their " modes," enters into his sys- 
tem ; on these two attributes that system wholly rests, and that 
these alone can be known he affirms in his sixty-sixth Letter, 
where, after discussing the subject, he says: — "And so I con- 
clude that the human mind can attain a knowledge of no attribute 
of God except these." — Opp. I. 673, 674, ed. Paulus. 

* These principles are stated in the first fifteen Propositions of 
the First Part of his Ethics, in which Part he treats of God. 

t Ethices P. I. Prop. 18. Opp. II. 54. 

J " Causa immanens dicitur, quae producit efFectum in seipsa. 

Causa transiens dicitur, quas producit efFectum extra se." 

Burgersdicii Institut. Metaphys. The words were in common use 
in these senses by the scholastic writers before and after the time 
of Spinoza. 

29* 



342 THE MODERN GERMAN 

The sole substance of the universe is the God 
of Spinoza. 

To this substance, considered in itself, dis- 
tinct from the effects produced by it in itself, 
and as the cause of those effects, he gives the 
name also of Natura naturans, vy^hich may be 
explained by the equivalent term, causal Na- 
ture ; while to the modifications produced by it 
in itself, that is, to the phenomena of the uni- 
verse, he gives the name of Natura naturata, for 
vrhich we may substitute phenomenal Nature,^ 

To this substance considered in itself, to his 
Natura naturans, that is, to his God, regarded 

* As this is an important point in his theory, I quote the pas- 
sage at length in which he explains his views : — 

" Antequam ulterius pergam, hie, quid nobis per Naturam natu- 
rantem et quid per Naturam naturatam intelligendum sit, explicare 
volo, vel potius monere. Nam ex antecedentibus jam constare 
existimo, nempe, quod per Naturam naturantem nobis intelligen- 
dum est id, quod in se est et per se concipitur, sive talia substan- 
tias attributa, quae aeternara et infinitam essentiam exprimunt, hoc 
est, Deus, quatenus, ut causa libera, consideratur. Per Natura- 
tam autem intelligo id omne, quod ex necessitate Dei naturae, sivei 
uniuscujusque Dei attributorum sequitur, hoc est, omnes Dei attri- 
butorum modos, quatenus considerantur, ut res, quae in Deo sunt et 
quae sine Deo nee esse, nee concipi possunt." — Ethices P. I. 
Prop. 29, Schol., pp. 61, 62. 

By causa libera Spinoza means nothing more than a cause un- 
constrained by any other ; as he explains in the demonstration of 
the seventeenth Proposition of the First Part, and in the corollaries 
to it, pp. 51, 52. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 348 

as the cause of all things, he expressly denies 
both intellect and will, and argues at length 
against ascribing them to God. " I will show," 
he says, " that neither intellect nor will belongs 
to the nature of God." * 

" If intellect and will belong to the eternal 
essence of God," says Spinoza, reasoning against 
the supposition, " certainly something must be 
understood by each attribute different from what 
men commonly mean. For the intellect and 
will which would constitute the essence of God 
must differ entirely from our intellect and will ; 
nor could there be any correspondence between 
them except in name ; that is, no other corre- 
spondence than exists between the constellation 
called the Dog, and a dog a barking animal ; 
which I will thus prove." f 

The purpose of Spinoza is to prove that we 
cannot ascribe intellect and will to the Deity in 
any intelligible sense of the words, in any sense 
in which we use them, and therefore that it is 
irrational to ascribe them to the Deity at all. 
He gives the following as the conclusion of his 
reasoning : — " Therefore the intellect of God, 
so far as it is conceived of as constituting the 

* " Ostendam, ad Dei naturam neque intellectum, neque volun- 
tatem pertinere." — Ibid. Prop. 17, SchoL, p. 52. 
t Ibid. p. 53. 



344 THE MODERN GERMAN 

divine essence," that is, so far as it is conceived 
of as an essential attribute of God,* " differs 
from our intellect both as respects its essence 
and existence, and can agree with it in nothing 
but in name, which it was my purpose to 
prove." It was of course the purpose of Spi- 
noza to prove ultimately the proposition which 
he had laid down at the commencement of his 
argument, that " neither intellect nor will be- 
longs to the nature of God." 

But though the denial of intellect to the De- 
ity is a fundamental characteristic of the system 
of Spinoza, there are other positions in his sys- 
tem which seem, at first view, irreconcilable 
with it. As I have before observed, Spinoza 
supposes that but two attributes of his God can 
be known by man, and these are infinite exten- 
sion and infinite thought In the Second Part 
of his Ethics, (in which it is to be noted that 
he is professedly treating, not of God, but of 
the human mind,) his first Proposition is : — 
" Thought is an attribute of God ; or God is a 
thinking thing," res cogitans, — which strange 
expression should be remarked. He says that 
God understands or knows himself, seipsum 

* In the fourth of his Definitions (Part I.) he says : — " By an 
attribute I understand that which the intellect perceives concerning 
a substance as constituting its essence." 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 345 

intelligit^ He repeatedly speaks, in this Part 
and elsewhere, of the intellect of God. He 
says that " God loves himself with infinite in- 
tellectual love." ^ And what is remarkable, he 
makes no express attempt to reconcile these ap- 
parent contradictions. But the solution which 
he does afford, without expressly recognizing 
the contradiction, is altogether consistent with 
his denying intellect to God, considered as the 
cause of all things. 

This solution I shall first state in my own 
words, thus : — All nature, the universe consid- 
ered as an effect, consists only of infinite modes 
or modifications of the one infinite substance, 
the God of Spinoza. But whatever may be af- 
firmed of the modes or modifications of any be- 
ing, taken collectively, may be affirmed of that 
being itself Phenomenal Nature (Natura na- 
turata) is as truly God as causal Nature. Now 
in the infinite universe there are infinite thought 
and intellect, and a knowledge or understand- 
ing of God (for according to Spinoza, there is 
nothing else to be known or understood but 
God X) ; and all this may be predicated of God, 

* Eihices P. II. Prop. 3, Schol., et alibi, 
t Ibid. P. V. Prop. 35. 

X " Intellectus actu finitus, aut actu infinitus, Dei attributa Dei- 
que affectiones comprehendere debet et nihil aliud." — Ethices P. 



346 THE MODERN GERMAN 

considered, not as a cause, but as phenomenal 
Nature. I shall now quote to this effect the 
words of Spinoza himself. 

" Actual intellect," he says, that is, intellect 
actually existing,* " whether finite or infinite, 
as also will, desire, love, &c., must be referred 
to phenomenal Nature (ad Naturam naturatam), 
not to causal Nature (non vero ad naturan- 
tem)."!* 

I. Prop. 30. Spinoza here, as commonly, uses debet in the sense 
of must^ as implying logical necessity. 

I add the forty-seventh Proposition of the Second Part (p. 120) : 
" Mens humana adaaquatam habet cognitionem aeternas et infinitae 
essentiae Dei." 

* In scholastic language the terms actual and potential existence 
are used technically. A being is said to exist actually when it 
really exists ; to exist potentially, when it does not really exist, but 
its existence is possible. Thus, for example, the rose lying on the 
table before me has actual existence ; the same rose, last winter, 
had potential existence, or, in other words, its existence was pos- 
sible. The term actual is expressed in scholastic Latin by actu, in 
actu, {existens being understood,) or actualis, and potential in a 
similar manner by potentid, in potentid, or potentialis. Thus it is 
said : — " Per essentiam Ens est id quod est, et per existentiam 
actu est quicquid actu atque extra suas causas est." " Esse po- 
tentia est posse existere, ut tamen actu non existat." 

In a scholium Spinoza remarks that he uses the term intellectus 
actu, that his meaning may be perfectly clear ; not because he al- 
lows the existence of any potential intellect {non est quia concedo 
ullum dari intellectum potentid) ; — that is, he does not allow the 
possibility of the existence of any intellect in the universe but 
what does exist. 

t Ethices P. I. Prop. 31, p. 62. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 347 

This ascribing of intellect to phenomenal and 
not to causal Nature is a main point in the sys- 
tem of Spinoza ; and from ignorance of it, or 
inattention to it, I suppose his doctrine con- 
cerning God to have been often misunderstood. 
I shall, therefore, produce other passages to the 
same effect as that just quoted. 

" Will and intellect have the same relation to 
God as motion and rest, and generally as all 
natural phenomena (omnia naturalia), which 
are necessarily determined by God to exist and 
operate in a certain manner 

" Will does not more pertain to the nature of 
God than other natural phenomena, but has the 
same relation to it as motion and rest, and as 
all other natural phenomena." * 

That is, will and intellect may be affirmed of 
God only as motion and rest may be affirmed 
of him ; that is, only of God considered as Na- 
tura naturata, phenomenal Nature. 

In the Second Part of his Ethics there are 
many passages that involve the main idea of 
the following. 

" A knowledge of whatever takes place in 
the human mind necessarily exists in God, so 

* Ibid. Prop. 32, Coroll. 2, pp. 63, 64. 



348 THE MODERN GERMAN 

far as he constitutes the nature of the human 
mind." * 

Though the expression of the following pas- 
sage is in some respects obscure, it is clear as 
regards our present purpose. 

" It appears that our mind, considered as in- 
telligent, is an eternal mode of thought, which 
is limited by another eternal mode of thought,"]* 
and that again by another, and thus to infinity, 
so that, altogether, they [that is, human minds, 
or minds like the human] constitute the eter- 
nal and infinite intellect of God." J 

" I think," he says, in a letter to his disciple 
De Vries, " that I have clearly and evidently 
shown that intellect, though infinite, belongs to 
phenomenal^ and not to causal Nature'' § 

* P. II. Prop. 12, Demonstr., p. 88. Conf. Prop. 11, CoroU. ; 
Prop. 38, Demonstr. ; Prop. 40, Demonstr. ; Prop. 43, Demonstr. ; 
P. III. Prop. 1, Demonstr. 

f To explain Spinoza's words, " eternal mode of thought," we 
must recur to the fact, that he regards all human minds as modes 
or modifications of the eternal and infinite attribute of cogitation or 
intellect which he ascribes to his God, and as partaking of the 
eternity of that attribute. " Any thing," he says, " which neces- 
sarily follows from the absolute nature of any attribute of God can- 
not have a determinate duration, but through the same attribute is 
eternal." — P. I. Prop. 21, Demonstr. 

We have passed far beyond the bounds of meaning ; but I must 
advert to this passage hereafter in another connection. 

X P. V. Prop. 40, Schol., p. 297. 

§ Epist. 27. 0pp. I. 524. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 349 

There is no doubt, therefore, that Spinoza 
denies to his God, considered as the cause of all 
things^ both intellect and will. But he also 
gave the name of God to what we call the 
created universe, to all finite things regarded 
collectively, to the modes of the infinite sub- 
stance produced in it by itself, to nature con- 
sidered as an effect ; and to this he ascribes infi- 
nite intellect, not as an attribute of a personal 
being, but meaning by that term the infinite 
aggregate of intellect which exists in the total- 
ity of finite, thinking beings. 

The expositors of Spinoza who regard him as 
an authority in philosophy and religion have 
been perplexed by his seemingly opposite asser- 
tions concerning God as an intelligent being; 
but have none of them, I believe, proceeded 
further in reconciling these assertions than one 
of the latest of their number, Sigwart, who 
says : — " The contradictions [contradiction] 
which some at the present day find in the cir- 
cumstance, that Spinoza on the one side speaks 
of a self-knowledge of God, of an idea which 
God has of his being and its necessary conse- 
quences, and on the other side places intel- 
lect, even infinite intellect, in the sphere of 
phenomenal Nature, Natura naturata, are [is] 

30 



350 THE MODERN GERMAN 

not altogether insolvable But this is 

not the place actually to give a solution of it; 
the less so, because Spinoza himself affords no 
clew for such a solution." * But without af- 
fording any satisfactory, or indeed intelligible, 
means of reconciling this contradiction, some 
of his expositors (as Sigwart himself) have at- 
tempted to prove that he was not an atheist, by 
appealing to his declarations that intellect is 
to be ascribed to the substance or being that 
he calls God. The solution that I have given 
of his apparently contradictory language may 
show in what sense these declarations are to be 
understood. 

As we have already seen,f the doctrine of 
Spinoza is, that, in ascribing intellect and will 
to the nature of God, we use words without 
meaning ; that they can express nothing resem- 
bling such intellect and will as we are acquaint- 
ed with, nothing therefore of which we can 
form a conception. In what follows we shall 
see that he denies the existence of any intellect 
or will in God having relation to his creatures, 
any intellect or will about which they can have 
any concern. 

* Der Spinozismus historisch und philosophisch erlautert (Tu- 
bingen, 1839), pp. 127, 128. 
I See before, p. 343. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 351 

It is the doctrine of Spinoza, that all the phe- 
nomena in the universe are the result of an in- 
evitahle necessity ; of the necessary operation 
of the laws of the Divine Nature, or, in other 
words, of causal Nature. Nothing could be 
otherwise than as it is * According to him, 
there is no benevolent purpose in Nature. He 
denies that his God proposes to himself any 
purpose, or that there is any plan in the uni- 
verse.-f " Men commonly suppose," he says, 
" that all things in nature act for some end, 
like themselves ; and even maintain, as indubi- 
table, that God himself directs all things to 
some certain end." % He first undertakes to 
explain the origin of this prejudice, and then 
to prove its falsity. " The prejudice," he says, 
" has become a superstition, and struck its 
roots deep into men's minds. Hence every one 
strives earnestly to understand and explain 
the final causes of all things. But in endeav- 
oring to show that Nature does nothing in vain 
(that is, nothing but for the use of men), they 
seem to have shown only that Nature and the 
Gods are as foolish as men." § He commences 

* Ethices P. I. Prop. 33, pp. 64 seqq. 

f P. I. Appendix, pp. 68-76. Conf. P. IV. Praefat. pp. 200, 
201. 

X Appendix, p. 69. 
^ Ibid. p. 70. 



352 THE MODERN GERMAN 

his second head by saying : " Not many words 
are necessary to show, that Nature proposes to 
itself no end, and that all final causes are noth- 
ing but human figments." * 

" The opinion of those who subject all 
things to " what Spinoza calls " a certain indif- 
ferent will of God, and maintain that all things 
depend on his good pleasure, is less wide from 
the truth," he says, " than that of those who 
maintain that God does all things with refer- 
ence to good." -t" 

This is the system which has had so powerful 
an effect on German philosophy and theology, 
and which lies at the basis of that work of 
Schleiermacher in which the eulogy of its au- 
thor is introduced. 

" To conceive of the personality of God," 
says Schleiermacher, " as resembling human 
personality, commonly implies a consciousness 
which is even morally impure." There is a great 
difference, according to him, between conceiv- 
ing of God as having this sort of personality, 
and believing in a living God. " Every one 
may be accounted pious who believes in a liv- 
ing God." X Truly religious men have never 

* Ethices P. I. Appendix, p. 71. 
t P. I. Prop. 33, Schol. 2, p. 67. 
X Ueber die Religion, p. 141. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 353 

been zealous for the conception of the person- 
ality of God, " and so far as by atheism is 
meant, as is often the case, nothing more than 
a shrinking back from it, and doubt concerning 
it, a truly pious man will regard the existence 
of this around him with great indifference." * 

In this passage human personality is implied- 
ly denied to God. But personality is but of 
one kind, admitting no modifications or de- 
grees. The w^ord must have the same mean- 
ing, whether used of a man, an angel, or the Di- 
vinity. To deny human personality to God, or 
personality like that of man, is to deny a per- 
sonal God. The epithet " human " can serve 
merely as a blind, or to suggest that it is allow- 
able to use the word " personality " in some 
sense of which we have no conception. 

It is further implied, that God is a living 
God. There is one sense of the word " living," 
in which we speak of organic material bodies 
as living. There is but one other sense, that 
in which the term is applied to beings capa- 
ble of perception, possessing mind in some 
degree or other. Unless it be contended that 
God is a material organization, it is in the lat- 
ter class of beings that he must be included. 



* Ibid. p. 117. 
30* 



354 THE MODERN GERMAN 

To apply, then, to him the epithet of living^ 
meaning a living being possessed of mind, and 
to deny his personality, — that is, to deny his 
consciousness of his own existence, to represent 
him as utterly passive and powerless, for a be- 
ing can exercise no power of which he is un- 
conscious, — to bring together these ideas, and 
all the others connected with them, is to pre- 
sent as gross an absurdity as the mind is capa- 
ble of entertaining. 

Of the new theology Schleiermacher was at 
one time considered an oracle. In further 
illustration of its character I will give an ex- 
tract from him relating to the fundamental doc- 
trine of Christianity, the immortality of man. 

" I believe," he says, " that I have fully set 
before you the manner in which every pious 
person has within him. an unchangeable and 
eternal existence. For, when our feeling 
cleaves to nothing individual, but embraces as 
its sole object our relation to God, in which all 
that is individual and perishable is swallowed 
up, then is there nothing perishable in it, but 
only what is eternal ; and it may truly be said, 
that the religious life is that in which we have 
already sacrificed and renounced all that is 
mortal, and actually enjoy immortality. But 
the manner in which most men conceive of im- 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 355 

mortality, and their longing after it, appear to 
me irreligious, and directly contrary to the 
spirit of piety. Nay, their wish to be immortal 
has no other ground than an aversion to what 
is the aim of religion." The great aim of relig- 
ion, he goes on to say (as I formerly explained 
his doctrine), is the divesting ourselves of our 
personality, and the becoming one with the 
Infinite. But those, he proceeds, who receive 
the common doctrine of immortality, struggle 
against this ; " they are anxiously concerned 
about their personality ; and thus, far from be- 
ing willing to seize their only opportunity to 
rise superior to it, — that afforded them by 
death, — they are anxious how they shall take 
it with them beyond this life; and aspire, at 
most, for eyes of wider vision and better limbs. 
But God speaks to them, as it is written, ' He 
who loses his life for my sake will preserve it, 
and he who would preserve it will lose it.' The 
life which they would preserve is one not to be 

preserved The more they long after an 

immortality which is none, and which they are 
not even capable of conceiving, (for who can 
succeed in the effort to represent to himself an 
existence in time as eternal ?) the more they 
lose of that immortality which they might ever 
possess, and lose with it this mortal life, by in- 



356 THE MODERN GERMAN 

dulging thoughts that cause vain anxiety and 

distress * The aim and character of a 

religious life is not such an immortality as many 
wish for and believe in ; — or, perhaps, only 
pretend to believe in ; for their desire to know 
too much of it makes their belief very suspi- 

* Schleiermacher well knew how to mock with some lip-phrase; 
and, conformably to this, he here introduces a passage which it is 
proper to quote. 

*' He who has learned to he more than himself knows that he 
loses little when he loses himself. Only he who, thus renoun- 
cing himself, has become blended, as far as in his power, with the 
whole universe, and in whose soul a greater and holier desire has 
sprung up, — on'y he has a right to, and only with him may there 
really be, any further discourse of those hopes which death gives 
us, and of the infinity to which we may infallibly raise ourselves 
through it." 

It would be idle to inquire what hopes and what infinity 
Schleiermacher would hold out to a being whose personal exist- 
ence is to cease with death. 

An expression which I have used above, in connection with the 
whole subject, brings to my mind a passage of much beauty from 
a late poem : — 

" Is it a boon, when dissolution's strife 
Hangs, trembling, o'er the bed of child or wife, 
And the poor sufferer turns amid her pain, 
And looks, and strives to say, ' We meet again,' — 
Is it a boon to stand in anguish by. 
And meet with some lip-phrase that clinging eye, 
Whilst the sad sceptic heart makes no reply ? 
Then, bending o'er the tomb to which she sank, 
Present to feel — and Future — one mere blank? " 

Kenyon's Bhymed Plea for Tolerance. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 357 

cious ; — not that immortality which is out of 
time and after time, or rather only after the 
present time, yet still in time ; but the immor- 
tality which already, in this temporal life, we 
may immediately possess, and which is a prob- 
lem in the solution of which we are continu- 
ally engaged. In the midst of finiteness to be- 
come one with the Infinite, and to be eternal 
in every moment, — that is the immortality of 
religion." * 

Such is the conclusion of Schleiermacher's 
Discourse on the Essence of Eeligion. In his 
note on the passage I have quoted, he says : " I 
wish nothing more than that every man may 
see himself, not only divested of all the foreign 
apparel for which he is indebted to the out- 
ward circumstances of life, but also after hav- 
ing laid aside these pretensions to an endless 
existence ; in order that he may determine, when 
he regards himself such as he really is, whether 
these pretensions be any thing more than such 
titles as the mighty of the earth often deck 
themselves with, to countries which they have 
never possessed, nor will possess." •)* 

According to Schleiermacher, we may " be 

* Ueber die Religion, pp. 118- 121. 
flbid. p. 141. 



358 THE MODERN GERMAN 

eternal in every moment." This is one of those 
propositions of such startling absurdity, that 
they may create a momentary suspicion that 
some portentous truth is veiled in their dark- 
ness. But in this sentence, no truth, literally 
or figuratively expressed, is to be discovered. 

Eternity involves an idea, the idea of infinity, 
the full comprehension of which transcends the 
powers of the human mind. We can have no 
other conception of infinity than as the absence 
of all limitation. Time without limitation is 
the only idea we can have of eternity. The 
proposition, that we may be eternal in every 
moment, has no other significance than that we 
may live an unlimited duration in every mo- 
ment. 

The words of this proposition cannot be un- 
derstood as improperly used in a transitive or 
figurative signification; for no such significa- 
tion can be assigned to them. In this, as well 
as in other passages of the theologians and 
metaphysicians of the modern school, the word 
" eternal" is so connected as to show that it re- 
quires to be understood as denoting unlimited 
duration. Here, in the passage before us, the 
eternal existence which may be enjoyed every 
moment is directly opposed to the immortality, 
the never-ending existence, which the Christian 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 359 

hopes for after death ; and the antithesis would 
be futile if by the eternity to be enjoyed in 
every moment were signified any thing else 
than a never-ending existence. Such is the 
character of the proposition. But we cannot 
suppose that any man having the use of his 
reason could enunciate it in the only sense 
which the significations of its separate words 
admit. There would be no greater folly in af- 
firming, that, when we occupy any portion of 
extension, we fill infinite space. It is a mysti' 
cal proposition, put forward in the vain hope 
that some hazy meaning may gather round it. 

This unintelligible abuse of the words "eter- 
nal" and "eternity" is derived from Spinoza. 
According to him, " individual things are noth- 
ing but affections or modes of the attributes 
of God." * They follow necessarily from the 
nature of God, " and whatever follows necessa- 
rily from the absolute nature of any attribute 
of God cannot have a determinate duration, 
but through the same attribute is eternal." f 
He compares individual things to " eternal 
truths," which have no relation to time. J " If 

* Ethices P. I. Prop. 25, CorolL 
f Ibid. Prop 21, Demonstr. 

J Ibid. Definit. 8, Explicat., compared with the subsequent 
references to it in his work. It is perhaps hardly necessary to ob- 



860 THE MODERN GERMAN 

we attend to the common opinion of men," he 
says, "we shall see that they are conscious of 
the eternity of their minds, but confound eter- 
nity with duration, attributing it to the imagi- 
nation or memory which they believe to remain 
after death." * And so on, more or less dis- 
tinctly, in various passages. 

The last conspicuous manifestation of the 
character of the new theology appears in the 
writings of Strauss. Few products of this the- 
ology, I might rather say none, have excited so 
much attention as his " Life of Jesus, critically 
treated," — an attack, as has been before men- 
tioned, on the credibility of the Gospels. To- 
ward the end of this work he gives his view of 
what he calls the Christology, meaning, I sup- 
pose, the doctrine concerning Christ. The pas- 
sage taken as a whole has no meaning, prop- 
erly speaking, that is, it presents no sequence of 
ideas which the understanding is capable of re- 
ceiving, yet it is still a very instructive one, as 
showing the character of those speculations 
which had become popular among his readers. 

serve, that, in speaking- of eternal truths, we use the word in its 
common acceptation, as meaning what always have been and al- 
ways will be truths, in contradistinction from such as are true only 
in reference to particular temporary circumstances. 
* Ethices P. V. Prop. 34, Schol. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 361 

" The key of the whole Christology," he says, 
"is this, that the subject of those predicates 
which the Church ascribes to Christ is not to 
be regarded as an individual, but as an Idea ; a 
real Idea^ however, — not as, according to Kant, 
an imaginary one. Considered as existing in 
an individual, in a God-man, the attributes and 
offices which the doctrine of the Church as- 
cribes to Christ are inconsistent with each other ; 
in the Idea of the species, they agree together. 
Humanity is the union of the two natures, it 
is God become man ; the Infinite Spirit re- 
nouncing its infinity and becoming finite, and 
the finite spirit conscious of its infinity.* It is 
the child of the visible mother and the invisi- 
ble father ; of Spirit and of Nature. It is the 
worker of miracles ; inasmuch as, in the prog- 

* This language refers to the doctrines of Hegel, whose meta- 
physical system is of the latest fashion in Germany, and who 
maintains the unity of Spirit, human and divine, as the element of 
the universe ; or, in the words of- Strauss (Vol. II. p. 709), which 
cannot be rendered into English so as to give a show of meaning ; 
" dass der gottliche Geist in seiner Entausserung und Erniedri- 
gung der menschhche, und der menschliche in seiner Einkehr in 
sich und Erhebung iiber sich der gottliche ist " ; " that the Divine 
Spirit in its renunciation and abasement is the human, and the hu- 
man in its withdraival into itself, and its elevation above itself, is the 
Divine''''; or, as he elsewhere expresses it, that "God and man 
are in themselves [essentially] one " : " Gott und Mensch an sich 
sind Eins." 

31 



362 THE MODERN GERMAN 

ress of man's history, the spirit is continually 
obtaining more fiill mastery over nature, both 
in man and around him ; nature becoming sub- 
jected to its activity as a powerless material. 
Humanity is the sinless ; inasmuch as the pro- 
cess of its development is blameless ; pollution 
cleaves only to the individual, but in the spe- 
cies, and in its history, is thrown off. It is 
Humanity that dies, and rises from the dead, 
and ascends to heaven ; inasmuch as, through 
the negation of its naturality [what in its com- 
position belongs to nature], it is continually at- 
taining a higher spiritual life, and by throwing 
off its finiteness, as a personal, national spirit, 
a spirit of this world, its unity with the infinite 
spirit of heaven is brought out. Through faith 
in this Christ, particularly in his death and res- 
urrection, is man justified before God ; that is 
to say, through the quickening of the Idea of 
Humanity within him the individual becomes a 
partaker of the divinely human life of the spe- 
cies ; — conformably to the fact, that the nega- 
tion of naturality and sensuality * — which is 
but the negation of a negation, seeing that they 
are but the negation of the spiritual — is the 
only way for men to attain the true spiritual 
life. 

* Sinnlichkeit : — See before, p. 287. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 363 

" This alone is the absolute purport of the 
Christology. That this appears connected with 
the person and history of an individual, belongs 
merely to its historical form." * 

Such a passage is adapted to give a strong 
impression of the state of intellectual action in 
a country, where writing of this kind, instead 
of being received with universal wonder and 
derision, was regarded as matter of grave dis- 
cussion, and as belonging to the highest depart- 
ment of philosophy. 

The latest development which I have seen of 
the results to which the new theology has ar- 
rived is in the work of Strauss, before men- 
tioned, on the " Doctrines of Christianity," 
which appeared almost simultaneously with the 
fourth edition of his " Life of Jesus." In that 
work he maintains the doctrine of Hegel con- 
cerning what Hegel calls God, and defends it, 
against some of his mistaken disciples, from the 
imputation of resembling the Christian doc- 
trine, or that of any believer in the personality 
of the Supreme Being. The concluding chap- 
ters of the work are occupied with an attack 
on the belief of the future life, and of the im- 
mortality of the soul. His last words are 
these : — 

* Leben Jesu (4th ed.), II. 709 - 711. 



364 THE MODERN GERMAN 

" If now the question be asked, what there is 
positive to set against these negations [involving 
the denial of the immortality of the soul], the 
whole answer (as Hegel too remarks) amounts 
to this; — that immortality is not to be conceived 
of as something future, but as a present quality 
of the spirit, as its inherent universality, its pow- 
er of raising itself above all finite things to the 
Ideal. If men are accustomed also to give the 
name of Eternity to the life after death, this 
involves essentially the same requisite to its 
right apprehension. Hence, thinkers, who are 
in other respects on the right track, at once take 
a wrong course when they sometimes so express 
themselves as if, after the manner of the an- 
cients, they would make immortality consist in 
posthumous fame, in the continued results of 
noble efforts, or even in being propagated 
through one's descendants, — in the reappear- 
ance in another of the Idea of Humanity* 
[Idea constituting a man] , which had perished 
in one individual. The blessed results of the 
actions of eminent men after their death, and 



* This language — one cannot say the conception, for there is 
none — is borrowed from Spinoza, according to whom men are 
only ideas ; an idea in God constituting their " essence and exist- 
ence." See particularly the Second Book of his Ethics, from the 
seventh to the eleventh Proposition. 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 365 

the continuance of their names, are only a re- 
flex of what was to them during life a present 
enjoyment of eternity, — occupation, namely, 
with essential interests, labor in the Ideal, 
So, too, the continuance of the species is a reflex 
of the present enjoyment of family love ; — and 
the metamorphosis of the universe is, not in its 
endless course, but as something recognized, 
and thus, consequently, apprehended as present, 
an eternalization of the spirit. The exhorta- 
tion of Schleiermacher, ' In the midst of finite- 
ness to become one with the Infinite, and to be 
eternal in every moment,' is all that modern sci- 
ence has to say about immortality. 

" Here, for the present, our business ends. 
For the other world is, in all respects, the one 
enemy, and, in its aspect as future, the last en- 
emy, which speculative criticism has to encoun- 
ter, and, if possible, to overcome." 

" And this, then, is thy faith ! " And he who 
announces it, and anticipates its victory, instead 
of veiling his head in abasement and utter des- 
olation of spirit, is contemplating with compla- 
cency a time when God and religion shall be 
dispossessed of the world, and nothing shall re- 
main but atheism, despair, the lowest moral and 
mental degradation, and German philosophy, 

31* 



366 THE MODERN GERMAN 

looking on with an idiot grin of triumph at its 
final success. 



" And this, then, is thy faith ! this monstrous creed ! 
This lie against the Sun, and Moon, and Stars, 

And Earth, and Heaven ! 

And know ye not. 
That leagued against ye are the Just and Wise, 
And all Good Actions of all ages past, 
Yea, your own Crimes, and Truth, and God in Heaven? 



Throughout a great part of the civilized 
world, men are restlessly craving for better 
forms of society and government ; for a deliver- 
ance from evils which they feel themselves, and 
which they see crushing others. Many are in 
the temper of unreasoning patients, so diseased 
and suffering that they are ready to adopt the 
pretended remedies of any impostor who boldly 
promises relief But the cure of long-contin- 
ued evils in a nation is analogous to the cure 
of long-continued diseases in an individual. It 
must be gradual ; it must be accomplished with 
great patience and care ; or the attempt to re- 
lieve may only aggravate the suffering. The 
existence of a well-organized state of society is 
solely the result of the character of the indi- 
viduals who compose it. Many seem to think 
that republican institutions are the grand spe- 



SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 367 

cific for the evils which exist ; but a republic, 
to escape the worst disorders, to escape the loss 
of its essential character, if not of its very form 
and name, must have for its foundation the re- 
ligious and moral principles of those who con- 
stitute and control it. In the most favored 
portions of our own land it is to the influence 
of moral principle, to the strong action of the 
sense of right and wrong, to the sympathy of 
man with man, that we owe our protection and 
security; — not to the immediate authority of 
government, nor to the exercise of civil or mil- 
itary force. Where this moral control does 
not exist, order can be preserved in a state only 
by substituting in its place human power, — 
arbitrary power lodged in the hands of an in- 
dividual or a class, whose self-interest it is 
to prevent lawless and disorganizing violence. 
The less there is of moral principle in a com- 
munity, the more stringent and irresponsible 
must be the power by which it is controlled. 
The government of banditti or of pirates must 
be despotic ; and when a republic of unprinci- 
pled men is sinking, as it will, into anarchy 
and the bloody strifes of faction, the only ref- 
uge is a dictator. The attempt to establish 
freedom among people unprepared to feel and 
act as freemen, has been often enough repeated 



368 GERMAN SCHOOL OF INFIDELITY. 

in our time to satisfy one as to what must be its 
result. It is but four years since, that the op- 
pressed and the reformers of Germany possessed 
themselves of the supreme power, but they were 
ignorant what to do with it. Even if they had 
had the wisest ends, they would have been un- 
able to employ their power to any good pur- 
pose. The materials to be worked upon, the 
individuals to be governed, had not the strong 
sense of religion, and of the obligations of man 
to man, which are necessary to bind men togeth- 
er in a well-regulated society, — principles the 
want of which can be supplied by no human 
institutions, no written constitutions or laws. 

Whatever tends to weaken the authority of 
religion, the authority of God, tends equally to 
the destruction of human happiness, and, espe- 
cially, in reference to the topic immediately be- 
fore us, to the destruction of all hope of better 
forms of human society. These must rest on 
the laws of God. Of his laws all human laws 
of binding force are but declaratory ; from them 
they derive all their intrinsic authority. They 
are obeyed because conscience enforces obedi- 
ence, — and this is perfect freedom. All other 
obedience to human laws must be only that 
which the direct or indirect dread of human 
power is able to compeL 



ON THE 

OBJECTION TO FAITH IN CHRISTIANITY, 

AS RESTING ON 

HISTORICAL FACTS AND CRITICAL 
LEARNING. 



First published in 1839, as a note to the Discourse on 
the Latest Form of Infidelity. 



ON Ax\ 



OBJECTION TO FAITH IN CHRISTIANITY. 



In the attempts of the German theologians 
of the new school to separate what they call 
Christianity from its historical relations and its 
connection with the New Testament, very much 
has been imperfectly and obscurely said upon 
the impossibility of resting religious faith on 
such foundations. What is said, though often 
not altogether intelligible, evidently refers to a 
view of the subject which it is important to 
consider; and to objections that may arise in 
an intelligent mind. I will endeavor to state 
them distinctly in my own words. 

It may be objected, then, to Christianity, that 
religion is a universal want, and should be 
founded on some universal principle of our na- 
ture ; but that Christianity, on the contrary, 
rests on something extrinsic to our nature, on 



372 OBJECTION TO FAITH 

testimony. That not only does this testimony 
m itself admit of doubt, but that it requires in- 
vestigation. That the capacity and the means 
of a proper investigation of it are far from be- 
ing common to all ; and that many, or rather a 
large majority, must therefore receive Christian- 
ity, if they do receive it, without any satisfac- 
tory evidence of its truth. Nor is this all ; it 
may be further objected, that the history of this 
supposed miraculous revelation is contained in 
certain books. In them are to be found the 
doctrines supposed to be made known. But a 
question immediately arises respecting the gen- 
uineness of those books. It cannot be certain- 
ly proved; for certainty is inconsistent with 
the nature of the only evidence that can be pro- 
duced. This evidence is, furthermore, such as 
requires much learning and study to enable any 
one, by himself, to estimate its force. And, 
supposing the genuineness of the books to be 
rendered probable, they are in ancient lan- 
guages, understood by few ; and even when the 
language is mastered, still much various knowl- 
edge is further necessary to give them a prob- 
able explanation. By the generality, therefore, 
the historical fact of a revelation, the genuine- 
ness of its supposed records, and the purport of 
its supposed doctrines, must all be received on 



IN CHRISTIANITY CONSIDERED. 373 

trust ; and the few who have the capacity and 
means of investigation can, at best, attain to 
nothing more than probable, not certain, con- 
clusions ; whereas religion, to be universal, 
should have an assured foundation in the very 
nature of man. It can rest upon nothing ex- 
trinsic to it. 

I have endeavored to state these considera- 
tions, which well deserve attention, with clear- 
ness and force ; avoiding those loose assertions, 
and that indefinite language, which some have 
fallen into from want of a distinct apprehension 
of what it was their purpose to urge. Let us 
now see what other view can be taken of the 
subject. 

In one sense, and an obvious sense of the 
words, religion is a universal want of man. It 
is required for the development of his moral 
and spiritual powers. He is suffering, tempt- 
ed, and imperfect; and he needs it for consola- 
tion, for strength to resist, and for encourage- 
ment to make progress. It is connected, not 
with any particular faculty or faculties, but 
with the whole nature of man as a moral and 
immortal being, a creature of God. But relig- 
ious principle and feeling, however important, 
are necessarily founded on the belief of certain 
facts ; of the existence and providence of God, 

32 



374 OBJECTION TO FAITH 

and of man's immortality. Now the evidence 
of these facts is not intuitive; and whatever 
ground for the belief of them may be afforded 
by the phenomena of nature, or the ordinary 
course of events, it is certain that the general- 
ity of men have never been able by their un- 
assisted reason to obtain assurance concerning 
them. Out of the sphere of those enlightened 
by Divine revelation, neither the belief nor the 
imagination of them has operated with any con- 
siderable effect to produce the religious char- 
acter. The belief of these facts, if it exist inde- 
pendently of Christian faith, must either be a 
mere prejudice, or must be a deduction of rea- 
son. But the process of reasoning required to 
attain the assurance of a Christian, if it might 
have been successfully pursued by a very wise, 
enlightened, and virtuous heathen, never was 
thus pursued; and it is scarcely necessary to 
say, that, to the generality of the heathen world 
before Christianity, the facts, that there is a 
God, in the Christian sense of that name, that 
man is immortal, and that the present life is a 
state of preparation for the future, were not 
matters of religious faith. Nor was there any 
likelihood that without Christianity they would 
ever become so. In rejecting Christianity, be- 
cause it requires a process of reasoning to es- 



IN CHRISTIANITY CONSIDERED. 375 

tablish its truth, if we attempt to provide any 
other foundation for religion, it can only be 
by having recourse to a different process of 
reasoning, which experience has shown to be 
inefficacious, as respects a great majority of 
men. 

But the rejection of Christianity on the 
ground just stated, and the pretence that the 
only true, universal source of religion is to be 
found in the common nature of man, have been 
connected by many with the rejection of all the 
reasoning by which those facts that are the ba- 
sis of religion may be otherwise rendered prob- 
able; and often with the rejection of all belief 
in the facts themselves. The religion of which 
they speak, therefore, exists merely, if it exist 
at all, in undefined and unintelligible feelings, 
having reference, perhaps, to certain imagina- 
tions, the result of impressions communicated 
in childhood, or produced by the visible signs 
of religious belief existing around us, or awak- 
ened by the beautiful and magnificent specta- 
cles which nature presents. Sometimes, as we 
have elsewhere seen, they are represented as 
being excited by a system of pantheism ; a doc- 
trine that rejects all proper religious belief, and 
does not admit of being stated in words ex- 
pressing a rational meaning. In this case, 



376 OBJECTION TO FAITH 

whatever feelings may exist, they can have no 
claim to be called religious. 

There is, then, no mode of establishing re- 
ligious belief but by the exercise of reason, 
by investigation, by forming a probable judg- 
ment upon facts. Christianity, in requiring 
this process, requires nothing more than any 
other form of religion must do. He who on 
this account rejects it, cannot have recourse to 
Natural Religion. This can oifer him no relief 
from the necessity of reasoning ; and still less 
can it pretend to give him any higher assurance 
than Christianity affords. If its voice be lis- 
tened to, it will only direct him back to Chris- 
tianity. If he will not refrain from using the 
name of religion, his only resource to escape 
the difficulty and uncertainty of reasoning is to 
take refuge in some cloud of mysticism, that 
belies the form of religion. 

From those who reject Christianity on ac- 
count of the labor necessary in fully ascertain- 
ing its evidences and character, it may reason- 
ably be required, that, whatever be the new 
form of religion which they propose, it shall 
be generally intelligible, and established by 
proofs not requiring an effort of thought to 
be expected only from disciplined minds ; and 
proofs, at the same time, as satisfactory as they 



IN CHRISTIANITY CONSIDERED. 377 

are easy to be understood. But the contrast is 
very great between this reasonable requirement 
and the character of the writings of those by 
whom the objection is urged. On the one 
hand, these writings are evidently not adapted 
to common comprehension ; and, on the other, 
in proportion as any one is accustomed to think 
clearly, and reason consecutively, so will he be 
the more struck with their uncertain meaning, 
or the absence of meaning, the inconsistency of 
thought, and the want, or the inconsequence, 
of reasoning. It has even been made a matter 
of boasting by the disciples of the school, that 
these speculations are to be understood only by 
minds of a peculiar cast, prepared for their re- 
ception. 

But we have not, it may be said, yet removed 
the difficulty, that the evidence and character 
of Christianity, in order to be properly under- 
stood, require investigations which are beyond 
the capacity or the opportunities of a great ma- 
jority of men. Let us then consider to what 
this difficulty amounts. 

In the first place, it is founded merely on the 
fact, that religious knowledge has the character 
common to all our higher knowledge, that it 
requires labor, thought, and learning to attain 
it. This is a fact; and it is a fact likewise, 

32* 



378 OBJECTION TO FAITH 

that its attainment is attended with peculiar 
difficulties, such as do not commonly embarrass 
men in the pursuit of mere worldly sciences ; 
since all vices and moral defects, all bad pas-^ 
sions, sinister motives, low affections, and selfish 
aims, — every thing contrary to perfect sincer- 
ity of purpose, — operate to draw us away from 
the truth. But these facts are true of the study 
of religion in general, not of that of Christian- 
ity alone ; and, therefore, form no special objec- 
tion to the character of Christianity. 

All the truths of philosophy, all those be- 
longing to the higher departments of knowl- 
edge, all those connected with the intellectual 
and moral progress of mankind, all those most 
important to our worldly comfort and enjoy- 
ment, so far as their recognition has depended 
on man alone, have required strenuous and 
long-continued efforts of intellect to effect their 
gradual development, their clear exposition, and 
their general reception. These efforts have 
been made by a few individuals, the instruct- 
ors of their race. The processes of reasoning 
by which these truths are established are now 
gone over and fully comprehended by only a 
comparatively small portion of men. But the 
benefit of these truths, the practical result of 
those investigations, are now a common prop- 



IN CHRISTIANITY CONSIDERED. 379 

erty and a common blessing. We are wise 
through the wisdom of others. Human knowl- 
edge is the aggregate wealth of civilized man, 
not the peculiar possession of individuals ; and 
all may share its advantages, whether or not 
they have contributed to it, or even understand 
the means of its accumulation. To take one 
example : — Throughout the enlightened por- 
tion of the world, the facts which astronomy 
has made known are generally received. These 
facts are applied to most important purposes, 
as regards our worldly concerns. By affording 
such facilities, as could not have been imagined 
before they existed, to the intercourse between 
nations, they have rendered incalculable ser- 
vice, in promoting civilization, knowledge, and 
the social virtues. They have made the heav- 
ens teach us religion, converting them into a 
natural revelation of God. But astronomy is a 
science which it has been the labor of more 
than two thousand years to bring to its present 
state. This science, its proofs and its relations, 
are now the study of a life. If, then, because 
what it teaches is not obvious, but requires 
long investigation, or because its proofs can 
be fully understood but by few, or because it 
is not the result of the unfolding of any faculty 
or tendency common to all men, any one should 



380 OBJECTION TO FAITH 

conclude that the truths which it makes known 
are to be rejected, and the benefits flowing from 
them disregarded, he would reason as wisely as 
he who reasons in a similar manner concerning 
Christianity. 

In the one case, and in the other, and 
throughout the whole sphere of our higher 
knowledge, the results of the intellectual ef- 
forts of a few become the common benefit of 
many. None has made himself master of all 
the departments of knowledge; none has fol- 
lowed out any one of them into all its ramifica- 
tions, and verified for himself every step in the 
evidence necessary to establish his belief He 
who fancies he may have done so can have lit- 
tle comprehension of the relations of any im- 
portant subject. However far one may have 
carried his own investigations, there is much 
that he receives because it is generally admit- 
ted as true, or because it is stated by writers on 
whom he is satisfied that he may rely. We are 
not insulated individuals, independent thinkers, 
whose business it is, each to build up a little 
system of his own out of the poor materials 
that he has gathered with the labor of his own 
hands. We are sharers in the wisdom of our 
race. The masses of knowledge which enlight- 
ened men are continually bringing into the 



IN CHRISTIANITY CONSIDERED. 381 

treasury of human improvement are soon con- 
verted into common currency. Each individual 
is not obliged to dig the ore from the mine for 
himself Those who think most wisely are 
instructors of each other. They receive much 
upon each other's authority. The foundation 
of their wisdom is the aggregate wisdom of the 
age in which they live. Linked together, as 
we are, intellectually as well as morally, the 
individual makes progress with those about 
him. "Whatever truths he may hold, he has 
not attained them by the unaided efforts of his 
own mind ; he has commenced with some share, 
great or small, in the common stock of knowl- 
edge. It cannot, therefore, be an objection to 
any truth whatever, and, consequently, not to 
the truth of Christianity, that the full compre- 
hension of its character and evidence is the 
result of studies which are pursued only by 
few, and that the many want capacity or oppor- 
tunity to satisfy themselves on the subject by 
their independent, unassisted exertions. 

But it may be said that no direct answer has 
yet been given to the question, — On what 
ground is the truth of Christianity to be re- 
ceived by those who are unable to give them- 
selves to a full study of its evidences ? The 
reply is, that it is to be received on the same 



382 OBJECTION TO FAITH 

ground as we receive all other truths of which 
we have not ourselves mastered the evidences ; 
for the same reason that we do not reject all 
that vast amount of knowledge which is not 
the result of our own deductions. Our belief 
in those truths the evidence of which we can- 
not fully examine for ourselves is founded in 
a greater or less degree on the testimony of 
others, who have examined their evidence, and 
whom we regard as intelligent and trustworthy. 
This is a ground of belief which is universal, 
and which if we relinquish, far the greater 
part of human knowledge must be relinquished 
with it. The likeness in the essential powers 
of men's minds gives them a common property 
in each other's acquisitions. What wise and 
honest men, who have devoted themselves to 
the examination of a subject, are satisfied is 
true, we may conclude, unless we can discern 
some special reason to the contrary, that we 
also should perceive to be true after similar in- 
vestigation. This reliance on the knowledge 
of others may be called belief on trusty or lelief 
on authority ; but perhaps a more proper name 
for it would be belief on testimony^ the testi- 
mony of those who have examined a subject to 
their conviction of the truth of certain facts. 
The reasonableness of such a belief is constant- 



IN CHRISTIANITY CONSIDERED. 383 

ly implied. In their opinions, and practical 
concerns, men are continually deferring to the 
judgment of those whom they think better in- 
formed than themselves. We commit our health 
and lives into the hands of a physician, relying 
implicitly on his opinions concerning our dis- 
ease and its cure, while of the correctness of 
those opinions we may have no means of form- 
ing a judgment, other than our belief in his 
information and good sense. To take an exam- 
ple from the science to which we have before 
referred : — very few individuals, scarcely one 
in a million throughout the civilized world, 
have gone through the whole body of evidence 
by which it is demonstrated that all the mo- 
tions of the bodies of the solar system in rela- 
tion to each other are to be referred to the one 
law of gravity ; yet he would be thought un- 
wise, who, because he had not studied this evi- 
dence, nor any part of it, should therefore 
doubt the testimony of those who have. In 
the application of this universal principle of 
belief to the evidences and character of Chris- 
tianity, all that is required of an intelligent 
man is, that he should admit it as an element 
in his reasoning ; that he should rely, to a cer- 
tain extent, on the trustworthiness of others 
who have made the subject their particular 



384 OBJECTION TO FAITH 

study ; that he should allow the truth of facts 
which they ajSirm, and which he sees no cause 
for doubting. Of the reasoning upon those 
facts he may judge for himself; and he will 
also judge to what extent he should thus re- 
ceive information on trust. But it is no objec- 
tion to Christianity, that a knowledge of its 
evidences and its character must rest in a cer- 
tain degree on what is a universal condition of 
human knowledge, trust in the capacity and 
honesty of others. The admission of this prin- 
ciple does not weaken the force of its evidences 
in the mind of any man of correct judgment. 
In maintaining, therefore, that the thorough 
investigation of the evidences and character 
of our religion requires much knowledge and 
much thought, and the combined and contin- 
ued labor of different minds, we maintain noth- 
ing that gives to Christianity a diiFerent char- 
acter from what belongs to all the higher and 
more important branches of knowledge, and 
nothing inconsistent with its being in its na- 
ture a universal religion. 

We have seen the reasonableness of believ- 
ing, to a certain extent, on trust ; or, if I may 
so use the term, on testimony. In considering 
the subject, the reasonableness of this principle 
of belief is not to be confounded with a very 



IN CHRISTIANITY CONSIDERED. 385 

important fact concerning it, — the fact that 
it is the actual foundation of belief in a great 
majority of mankind, on almost all subjects 
lying beyond the sphere of personal experience. 
There are those, who, in treating of man, seem 
to consider themselves as types of the human 
race in its actual condition ; and, over-estimat- 
ing perhaps their own powers of investigation, 
indulge in declamation concerning independence 
of thought, in which what is true is applicable 
only to a comparatively small number. Our 
first impressions, the belief of childhood, are 
the result of our trust in the testimony of oth- 
ers ; and a similar trust, whether it be recog- 
nized by them or not, continues to be with a 
majority of men a main source of their opin- 
ions. Without any reasoning on the subject, 
we expect the operation of this principle of 
belief We suppose, as a general fact, that one 
educated as a Roman Catholic will identify 
that form of faith with Christianity, however 
wide the difference may appear to us. We 
should regard it as a marvel, and as indicating 
extraordinary intellectual energy in the indi- 
vidual, should one brought up as a Mahome- 
tan become a sincere and intelligent Christian. 
The opinions of the majority of men are de- 
termined by the intellectual influences acting 

33 



386 OBJECTION TO FAITH 

upon them, which have their origin in a few 
minds. 

The principle, then, of believing on testimo- 
ny, however necessary and universal, may lead, 
and has led, to great errors ; but this character- 
istic it has in common with every other princi- 
ple of belief, except personal experience or 
mathematical demonstration. It is further to 
be observed, that all wrong opinions, though 
they may be propagated by it, must have had 
their origin in some other source. To what- 
ever errors this form of belief may lead, it is 
an inevitable concomitant of our nature. The 
generality of men can be no wiser than their 
instructors. 

This view of human belief, as resting in so 
great a degree upon what may be called testi- 
mony, serves to show strongly the responsibil- 
ity that lies on all those who undertake to in- 
fluence the opinions of their fellow-men, on any 
subject by their belief concerning which their 
moral principles or their happiness may be af- 
fected. Whoever may do so should have nat- 
ural capacity for the ofiice ; he should have the 
requisite knowledge, of which extensive learn- 
ing commonly makes a part ; and he should be 
influenced by no motives inconsistent with a 
love of truth and goodness, by no craving for 



IN CHRISTIANITY CONSIDERED. 387 

notoriety, no restless desire to be the talk of 
the day, no party spirit, and no selfish pur- 
pose of maintaining doctrines, the profession of 
which he cannot renounce without the loss of 
some worldly advantage. Before he inculcates 
any peculiar opinions, he should have thor- 
oughly studied them, have clearly defined them 
to his own mind, have traced out their rela- 
tions, and have become persuaded that future 
investigation will not lead him to change them. 
And further, he should believe himself to see 
clearly that their promulgation will tend to 
good; since, if there be a God who rules all 
things in infinite wisdom and goodness, no gen- 
eral law or fact in the universe can ultimately 
tend to evil, and consequently no general truth, 
or affirmation of such law or fact, can be ulti- 
mately mischievous. In proportion, therefore, 
as the beneficial effect of any doctrine is doubt- 
ful, so far is its truth doubtful, on the suppo- 
sition that there is a God. And if there be not 
a God, on which supposition truth might be 
mischievous, the moral offence of publishing a 
mischievous truth would still remain. 

Judging from the practice of the day, the 
responsibility of which I speak is not greatly 
regarded ; and we may conclude from the lan- 
guage which is freely used, that it is not gener- 



388 OBJECTION TO FAITH 

ally understood. Men throw out their opinions 
rashly, reserving to themselves the liberty of 
correcting them, if they are wrong. If you 
would know for what doctrines they hold 
themselves responsible, you must look to their 
last publication. It deserves praise, we are 
told, for one to confess himself to have been in 
error. It does, without doubt; as it also de- 
serves praise for one to repent of a crime and 
to make reparation ; but a wise and good man, 
as he will avoid committing crimes, so, accord- 
ing to his ability, he will avoid promulgating 
errors on important, or unimportant, subjects. 
Another loose notion is, that there should be 
no discouragement, by the expression of moral 
disapprobation, to the promulgation of any doc- 
trine, whatever may be its character, or what- 
ever may be the moral or intellectual qualifica- 
tions of the teacher; for that this would be 
putting a check upon freedom of discussion. 
The doctrine may be confuted, it is said, if it is 
erroneous. But it should be recollected, that 
many errors are in alliance with men's pas- 
sions, vices, and follies, and that, when plausi- 
bly affirmed, they may be readily admitted by 
those who will not listen to, or perhaps could 
not comprehend, a series of explanations and 
arguments. It should likewise be recollected, 



IN CHRISTIANITY CONSIDERED. 389 

that a writer careless of facts, bold in his asser- 
tions, and confused and illogical in his concep- 
tions, may commit more errors in a page, than 
an able man can confute in twenty ; that these 
errors may be so gross, that one conversant with 
the subject may regard the task of exposing 
them as unworthy of him ; and that it is hard 
to condemn such as are capable of informing 
others, to the poor employment of rooting out 
errors, the growth of which is encouraged by 
those who assign them the task. But it is only 
necessary to attend to the general principle, 
that, dependent as we all are upon the in- 
formation and the opinions of others, no one 
has a right to assume the office of our in- 
structor, who has not labored to qualify him- 
self morally and intellectually for its proper 
performance. 

But to recur to our general subject: — I have 
endeavored to state the objection, or the diffi- 
culty, which we have been considering, in the 
plainest manner, and, admitting it in its whole 
extent, have limited myself to a direct reply. 
It is said, that a great majority of men are not 
capable of investigating for themselves the evi- 
dences and character of Christianity, and there- 
fore can have no reasonable foundation for 
their belief in Christianity. The direct answer, 

34 



390 OBJECTION TO FAITH 

to which alone we have attended, is, that trust 
in the information, judgment, and integrity of 
others, to a greater or less extent, as it is a uni- 
versal and necessary, is also a rational principle 
of belief If this be true, any further answer 
is not required ; but very much more might be 
said to show the false view of the subject im- 
plied in that objection ; and to make it evident 
that every one, accustomed to thought and rea- 
soning, may, without any theological learning, 
strictly so called, be able to satisfy himself of 
the truth of Christianity by the exercise of his 
mind upon facts that cannot reasonably be 
doubted. But this subject involves the whole 
evidence of our religion ; and it has been my 
purpose merely to show that this evidence is 
not to be rejected, because it is analogous in its 
character to that by which every other impor- 
tant truth is established among men. 

The objection we have been considering goes 
directly against the possibility of any miracu- 
lous revelation from God, as a foundation of 
our religious belief It would condemn us, as 
a matter of necessity, to the desolation of our 
ignorance. It would darken its shades ; for, if 
Christianity be a delusion, if that religion 
which the most civilized portion of the world 
has professed, and the wisest men have be- 



IN CHRISTIANITY CONSIDERED. 391 

lieved, be founded in error; if that religion 
which has seemed to bring us near to God, and 
to confirm all our best hopes, and which has 
given vigor to every right motive, be false, — 
then a deeper and more chilling shade falls 
upon the world, and all human reasoning be- 
comes more uncertain. By the rejection of 
Christianity, man is not left in the state in 
which he was before its promulgation. A new 
and gloomy marvel appears in the history of 
our race. 

But, in truth, the mere fact that God has 
made a miraculous communication to men for 
their good, considered independently of any 
truths which he may have made known, is one 
of inexpressible interest. It introduces him 
within the sphere of human experience, and 
makes his existence a reality to our minds. It 
gives a definiteness to our ideas of him, that 
nothing else could afford. It presents him dis- 
tinctly to our conceptions and feelings in his 
paternal character. It establishes a relation 
between God and man that could not otherwise 
exist, and immeasurably elevates our race in the 
scale of being. Christianity, simply as a reve- 
lation from God, rises on the history of man, 
like the sun on the natural world. We may 
doubt, we may disbelieve it ; but it is vain to 



892 OBJECTION TO CHRISTIANITY CONSIDERED. 

contend that there cannot be plenary evidence 
of its truth, or that, this plenary evidence ex- 
isting, it cannot be made satisfactory to the 
ffeneralitv of men. 



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